


Gone Cold

by Born In Captivity- Ineligible to Release (Jashasedai)



Series: Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers [4]
Category: Formula 1 RPF, The Grand Tour (TV) RPF, Top Gear (UK) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers, Doubles of Every Character, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-18
Packaged: 2018-08-22 21:38:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 41,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8302064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jashasedai/pseuds/Born%20In%20Captivity-%20Ineligible%20to%20Release
Summary: In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.Edited for format and errors 08/29/17





	1. Hiring

**Author's Note:**

> Jaamies pronounced: yah-MEE-ehs
> 
> Notes:
> 
> Real People don't belong to me.
> 
> This story is fiction and is no reflection on anyone in it. The story does belong to me, as does the AU in which it is set.
> 
> Characters will be tagged in the chapters in which they appear.
> 
> Please comment, I like comments.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Hiring**   
**Espoo, Finland- 1996**

The sky was a low, solid grey color, and there was frost on the trees, the parked cars, and the edges of the brown grass. Without snow so far this year, the ground had frozen solid. The fingers of ice had reached deep into the earth and clutched the heart of the world. The wind was smooth and bracingly cold, like a stolen pull from a vodka bottle.

The boy on the steps of the school was wearing layers, a knit turtleneck of wool, a thick hat, and a puffy ski jacket in the colors of his favorite hockey team. He was leaning against the railing with his head down. Not huddling against the wind, just hunching. The warmth leached from his body had thawed a short stretch of the metal rail. Two boys from his class walked by and called greetings to him. He jutted his chin in acknowledgement and muttered, and they slowed a step. It wasn't like him to be so subdued, but one saw the crumpled report card in his hand, and nudged the other. Plenty of their classmates weren't going to be eager to get home today. The one who had noticed started to say something, but the sullen boy turned away from them and started walking down the sidewalk.

He didn't want to hear their encouragement, or jokes about his poor marks. He walked south, further towards the town center. What did it matter anyway? The things in school weren't going to be relevant to him. He was able to understand and sign his hockey contract, and he could do maths well enough to figure out what to do with his paychecks. His boots padded an easy rhythm, heavy and reliable boots a size too big for him, room for extra thick socks. It was easy to walk in large sized boots after 17 years of long winters and short summers.

He walked along the street, and it was cold, and he felt good, aside from some disappointment about his marks, and trepidation about how his parents would react. It didn't feel good that he was going to disappoint them.

He stopped on a curb and waited for the crosswalk. Well worn but well maintained small cars went by him, filled with housewives on last minute shopping trips or other errands before they would return home to have dinner ready for hard working husbands. The signal changed and he walked across the two lane street, up onto the sidewalk on the far side.

He would be fine without good marks to get him by, he told himself. Besides, now that he'd decided to stop dividing his attention between Motorsport and hockey, he'd have more time for homework, too. He could probably get his grades back up before graduation.

A car crawled up the street, the driver obviously scanning for some business or other. He glanced up when the beige town car crawled up beside him, pacing him. A voice in the back of his head said he should not talk to them, but he dismissed it. He was not a child, he was almost a man, he knew this area well enough to direct these men, they weren't going to abduct him. He stopped and the car stopped, even with him. He walked towards the driver side door.

Then the back window rolled down. His father was sitting inside.

"Kimi, I want you to get in the car. Now." he said, and somehow Kimi didn’t believe him.

He stepped back away from his father and the car, looking for a place to run. Then a man leaned into the window and said "Listen to your father, boy, and do what you're told."

Kimi scowled. Who was this man who though he had the right to treat Kimi like a little boy? Then he dismissed the misgivings – why would his father pick him up if it wasn't alright? Then again, he thought, as he opened the door and slid in on the leather seat beside him, why would his father be picking him up in the back of a Mercedes? With this man in the rear facing seat with the openly threatening presence? He looked like a gangster, his mind added as he observed the man in the suit sitting across from them.

"Don't look so grim, Kimi, no one's stolen your ice cream, I'm here to offer you a job." The contrast between the order to get in the car and the saccharine sweetness of this… reassurance… set Kimi's teeth on edge.

Kimi looked at his father, who looked defeated. Not physically injured, but his shoulders were slack and his upper lip was tight and raised, making his frown look beseeching. It was as though he was trying to ask Kimi for help. "Doing what kind of job?" He didn't look away from his father, whose frown deepened a little at the question.

He could see the man in the suit smile out of the corner of his eye. "Well, Kimi-boy, we think you have a real career ahead of you in racing. We think you could make it all the way to F1. We'd like to hire you to work for McLaren."

His eyes widened a little. He looked over at the man. With the mafia tactics, he'd been half expecting them to ask him to assassinate someone. He thought for a moment, during which the man's eyes darted to Kimi's father for just a fraction of a second. "A man already came and asked if I wanted to work for McLaren. I told him no."

The exaggeration of the surprised expression looked forced, practiced. "You've been racing for years, what could be better than getting a job offer from an F1 team? And as young as you are, it's practically unheard of. What could you possibly want more?"

"To play hockey."

The man waved this off. "No, that's not for you, you will like being in Formula 1. Only the best racing drivers in the world get to drive for Formula 1. And we want you. You will be famous, the world will know your face, beautiful women will throw themselves at your feet, and your name will be renowned." He smiled, and leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. "The man who approached you earlier offered you a great deal of money to sign with us. You need to reconsider his offer. Things will go well for you if you do. Otherwise, things may become difficult. Who knows if your career as a hockey player will work out? Many young men want to play hockey, but most aren't good enough, and many get injured in their first season. It would be very difficult for one to return to hockey if, say, one's arm was broken so badly he could never hold a stick, or one's knees were crushed so hard he could never walk, let alone skate. So think on it, Kimi-boy, would you rather have a life of excitement, fame and wealth as an F1 driver? Or would you rather play one season of hockey and spend the rest of your life crippled?"

Something about the emphasis on one season stuck in Kimi's mind, as though one season would be possible, but no more. As though he'd be allowed enough of a taste to always regret what had been wrested away from him.

Kimi looked at his father. This couldn't be happening; it had to be some sort of nightmare. No, his better judgment told him, it was just something deeper than he could imagine. These people were expending a lot of effort to get one kid to drive for them. There was something at stake here greater than just what he was seeing. They were obviously very willing to hurt him, enough that they didn't care that he knew it. Why?

"Matti," Kimi bridled to hear this man call his father by his first name, as though he was a boy. The sweet tone was definitely not going to make reappearance. "Please explain to your son that if he does not agree to work with us, that you will be in breach of contract, and what the terms were when you leased Kimi to us."

Leased Kimi to us. His father cringed at this almost as much as the boy did.

He couldn't look at his son. "Kimi, there were bills, we didn't lease you, it was just a contract saying you'd race until you were 16 and they'd pay the bills. Not a lease."

His skin tightened into goosebumps, as though he was being lowered slowly into the sea in winter. When he'd wanted to quit so many times throughout the years, his father had refused to let him. Then when he'd asked this year, and it had been so easy to get him to agree. He'd thought it was a sign of his father's respect, of realizing he was grown up, to make his own choices.

But his father wasn't done speaking. He went on to describe tricks in the contract, how the situation had gotten more and more desperate.

"Then they showed me the fine print, that if you didn't sign a contract with their team when they asked, that we'd have to pay back all the money, all at once. Kimi, if you don't… we're going to be bankrupt."

Kimi was floating behind himself, not really listening. The situation was already perfectly clear. His better judgement told him, 'They want whatever power over you they can get. If they know this hurts you, they'll use it again and again to control you. You can't let them use this to hurt you, you have to take the upper hand right now, and make sure you keep it. It will never hurt more than this, if you can make them think it does, they will keep using this, and you can harden yourself to it. You can't ever let them know what you know. If they are arrogant enough that they don't pretend, then you have to make them underestimate you. Make them show you what you want to know. Make them show you why this is so important.

What would make them show him what they wanted? Letting them think they knew what he wanted, he supposed. They assumed everyone was motivated by money. His father certainly had been. Most people were. "If I sign with you, you have to excuse my family's debt," he paused and watched the man's face, the almost invisible smirk. "And I want you to pay me more than the other man already offered me. I want twice as much"

He saw his father's face contract in quiet agony. He kept his own face smooth, letting out a careful dose of fear and anger. The man agreed to his terms, and he felt a little thrill of victory, until the man told him to keep silent, or forfeit the deal, and the car pulled up next to another walking figure, and his father summoned his brother into the car.

Until they were both tied to the same fate. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> This fic was beta'd by Marginaliana, who deserves credit for some of the best lines, and without whom none of this series would ever have been possible. You saved me, Marginaliana!


	2. A Match

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- A Match**   
**McLaren Main Training Facility (McLaren Stables)- 1999**

There was a corridor in the trackside building that McLaren had brought him to. It was filled with closed doors. The kind you found deep inside all buildings too large to have a window in every room. They were all padlocked but one. Kimi was standing in front of the last one on the right. He ran his hand through his short, white blond hair, wishing he could cool down. He was wearing black jeans, heavy boots, and a white turtleneck sweater. It was too hot inside this building. The people who worked here went from heated homes to heated cars to heated offices and never had to face the winter.

Kimi opened the door and stepped through, braced for a confrontation. His shoulders were tight, but not drawn back, and he was putting a little more swagger in his walk than he would otherwise.

There were two men in rough work shirts on either side of his soon-to-be partner. Both of them were kneeling on the floor, ranged around him. The white helmeted figure wore them like a vanguard, as though their downward pressing hands were not restraining him, as though he was perfectly at ease and had chosen to rest here for a moment.

This would have thrown Kimi off his stride a year ago, but he had spent this half year practicing in mirrors to make sure he wasn't reacting visibly to things. It made him think, though, as he knelt on the linoleum floor in front of the Racing Driver. He gestured like they'd shown him, even though they'd told him the Racing Driver wouldn't know he was there until Kimi bonded to him

He reached out and put his hands on either side of the helmet, and pulled, gently. They'd said he would resist, but he didn't, he even tilted his head to make it easier. The Racing Driver's hair was shaved short, and his eyes were greener than the human's. Kimi put his hands on either side of the other boy's face. The two teenagers looked at each other, expressionless. Then the Racing Driver's face spread into a big grin, and he looked away. Kimi dropped his hands and watched the lines of his partner's face.

He tapped him on the shoulder and gestured for him to come with him.

The men released their holds and he clambered to his feet to follow.

In the next room, further into the white drywall dungeon of a building, Kimi's manager handed him the paperwork on his new Racing Driver. The white-suited boy stood close at Kimi's elbow and crossed his arms, staring at Kimi's face. The paperwork was mostly stats. The Racing Driver, he saw, was born the first of May 1976, 3 years older than he was. No wonder they'd hired him so young. No point in wasting the brilliant lap times of a Racing Driver's prime years. He looked at the name and then at his manager.

"Jaamies? Why did they name him Iceman?"

"It's Jaime." He pronounced it HI-may. "His registration number is 9552H1May1976. Sometimes the colts get nicknames that stick." The manager shrugged. "Jaime is better than 9552H. It's just for the handlers to differentiate, it's not like he responds to it. Whatever you call him is what he'll respond to."

Kimi ran his thumb over the paperwork. Jaime. He looked at the pale, green eyed boy watching him. He liked Jaamies better. Iceman. "Iceman," he said, quietly.

He laid the paperwork on the table and filled in the name Iceman. He signed his own name underneath, on the line marked "In receipt of property."

"Come on, Iceman. I will show you the track."

He had wanted to hate the Racing Driver, but the feeling of utter acceptance and fascination he felt flooding him – from the moment he looked into green eyes, the color of grass appearing under melting snow – had changed all of that. He couldn't resent Jaamies. It just made him resent the company even more.

For giving him this burden he couldn't bear to put down. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	3. What Am I Supposed To Do?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- What Am I Supposed To Do?**   
**Silverstone Circuit, Silverstone, UK- 2000**

The Racing Driver was crouching on the balls of his feet against the wall in the bathroom. He wouldn't look at Kimi. He was wearing his white fireproof pants and shirt. His jumpsuit was in a heap on the floor. His driving shoes were against different walls. He took his hands off his face and put one arm against the wall and pressed his face against it.

The boy was hunching against the wall by the door, looking at him, then away, then back at him, and away again. Kimi had never heard a Racing Driver make any noise that sounded like an animal might make it until today. Instead of revs and hums and engine sounds, the Racing Driver was very clearly sobbing. His entire body rocked forward and backward with the force of it.

What had set him off? He'd retired early, and had gotten out of the car and stared around at the chaos of a racetrack on a race day. Families, people coming and going, discarded food on the ground. He'd seen it before, but this time his face twisted in rage and he dropped some comment about not being human then speed walked away before Kimi knew what was going on. Kimi looked at the helmet that had been carefully placed out of the way when the Driver had stormed in here. After Kimi had followed him all the way across the race grounds.

There had been a stark contrast between the way he'd treated the helmet and the jumpsuit he'd peeled off and the shoes he'd hurled at the walls while he'd alternated screaming through his clenched teeth and the gasping desperately for breath. Until he had crouched, covering his wet face with his hands and sobbing brokenly into them.

Kimi was embarrassed - it was rude to watch someone cry - but he couldn't leave him here alone. Anyone could walk in. Walk in and think it was Kimi crouched barefoot on the filthy bathroom floor, sobbing. A traitorous part of him thought that this behavior was unlikely from him.

Jaamies turned suddenly and looked at him. 'You're supposed to help me! You're not supposed to stand there being ashamed of me.' His face twisted and he sobbed again. 'I can't help it.' He sobbed again, this time so hard that he gagged and dry heaved.   
  
The boy pressed back against the door at this accusation. What was he supposed to do? Jaamies lost the race, again - what was Kimi supposed to do about it? He couldn't do it for Jaamies. If Jaamies wanted to win he would have to do it by himself.   
  
Jaamies closed his eyes. He let out a series of whimpering gasps. 'It hurts. It hurts and I can't help it. Please, don't leave me alone. Please don't make me do it alone.' He looked at Kimi again, eyes still streaming. Kimi could feel how badly he wanted to reach out to his human, but how his tensed body wouldn't let him. 'You're the man, you are supposed to do what I can't.'   
  
It still felt like this all had nothing to do with him. He felt like he was submerged in a frozen pond, looking up through the glass of ice at Jaamies' identical face. He didn't understand this reaction. He didn't understand his partner at all. The Racing Driver was right, though, standing here feeling ashamed wasn't helping. He stepped forward, and knelt down beside him. When Kimi had been young, and he had cried, his brother used to hold him and tell him what he'd done right. How good things COULD be and would be again. He pulled Jaamies to his chest. The Racing Driver fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around Kimi's middle, burying his face in Kimi's shoulder. 'The race wasn't that bad. You were making some really good corners. Your overtaking was genius.' He stroked Jaamies' hair. He hadn't done a very good job of cutting it, this time. Next time he would follow the instructions better. He was really impressed with how Jaamies had raced. He showed Jaamies his memory of how the crowd had cheered for him. This didn't have as much effect. He pointed out that Jaamies' footwork had been impeccable.   
  
Jaamies was calming down, now that he was in contact with Kimi. 'I can't, I can't help it,' he sent again. Kimi tried to apply this to something that made sense.   
  
'What can't you help?'   
  
'I am BETTER than this. Why are things going so badly? I'm doing my best.'   
  
Kimi thought about it, through a slight renewal of whimpering. 'I think it is because you are doing your best, but so is your car. It is not a very good car. If you had a car that would do what you ask it to, a car that was as good as you are, you would be able to beat them all the time.'   
  
Jaamies stilled as he thought about this. 'I can't change things with what I have. I just have to use what I have to do the best I can." Kimi could feel him absorb this, on a far deeper level than Kimi could understand, under the circumstances.   
  
A knock sounded on the door. They both whipped around in horror. "Kimi?"   
  
'No, no, no, they can't see both of us.' Jaamies' eyes were wide, he crawled backwards until he bumped into the adjoining wall, then cast around frantically. 'They can't see me. They can't see me with you.' He spotted his helmet, and lunged for it.   
  
Kimi looked to see if the door was locked. Another teenager wearing Kimi's helmet, and Kimi standing together in the bathroom was not going to deflect questions. He pulled his hat and sunglasses off and put them on Jaamies. 'Don't make any noise! Put your shoes on.' Kimi tucked the helmet under his arm.   
  
"Are you in there crying? People can hear you, man." Kimi's head shot up. It was Rami.   
  
"Uh, Rami. I...just a second..." He stepped forward to unlock the door.   
  
Terror nearly knocked him to his knees. 'WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"   
  
Taking a deep breath and pushing the calm he practiced in the mirror at Jaamies, he waved him off. 'I know what I'm doing.'   
  
"Rami, I need you to do something for me."   
  
"What's up, bro?"   
  
"Don't freak out. I'm going to open the door."   
  
"Don't freak out...what..." Kimi opened the door, bodily yanked his brother inside and closed and locked the door.   
  
Rami looked at the heap of racing suit and the teenager putting on his shoes in the bathroom. "What did you..." He looked again. The hat and sunglasses weren't exactly a foolproof disguise. He turned to Kimi. "Who..." His eyes did a flicking back and forth thing when he started connecting the dots. "Oh Kimi." His eyes closed and he visibly despaired for a tiny second. "You have a Racing Driver." He ran his hand over his eyes.   
  
Kimi watched as he figured out how he needed to react. Kimi's big brother got a handle on the situation and calmly took control of himself like the adult he had become. Kimi smiled at Jaamies, who shot him a look that said, 'This is better?' and finished tying his shoes.   
  
"Why are you two so far from the track? No, I heard." He turned and crouched in front of the replica of his brother. Kimi's world spun when Rami started speaking to Jaamies in gestures. As gently and lovingly as he spoke to Kimi. [Are you hurt? Crying because you're hurt? Take your glasses off. Let me make sure you're alright.]   
  
[I can't win.] Jaamies pulled the sunglasses off. The whites of his eyes were pink, and his green eyes were almost yellow with the reflected redness. [I didn't know how to ask Kimi to help. I am not hurt on the outside.]   
  
Rami gave him a sad smile. He made a gesture Kimi didn't recognize. [Feels that way, too, sometimes. I feel that way. Kimi feels that way, too, he just isn't best at showing it.] He had picked up Kimi's name gesture very quickly. Kimi suspected the gesture he hadn't known was Rami's Racing Driver's name. Rami was so kind to Jaamies, even though he wasn't his partner. How could he care for him so much when he didn't even know him? [Is he a good match, the rest of the time?]   
  
Jaamies nodded. He swallowed. [Kimi is home.]

Kimi felt an upwelling of love for his partner.  
  
[Home?] Rami repeated the gesture. [I don't know that gesture.] He tilted his head. Gestures had very specific meanings - one gesture could mean a variety of things, depending on how it was used, but very few of them had two gestures to mean the same thing. A language with lots of homonyms but almost no synonyms.   
  
"It means home," Kimi said. Jaamies used it all the time. Their bond was becoming home for both of them, Kimi realized.  
  
Rami got a weird look on his face. Then he nodded. [Good.] He stood up and turned back to Kimi. "What did you need me to bring for you?"   
  
"I have a balaclava in my gym bag, back with the team. And please bring the snack bag. He's really-" He gestured a word that didn't have a spoken translation. It meant the metabolic drop a Racing Driver went through after the physical exertion of a race. That one Rami understood perfectly. All matches did.  
  
"Yeah, I'll get them." He went out the door.   
  
'Let's get your face cleaned up.' Kimi pulled a paper towel out of the dispenser and wet it with cool water from the sink. Jaamies wiping his face with hands dirty from the floor had left streaks all over his pale skin. Kimi wiped him down, softly.   
  
'I can wipe my own face.'   
  
'I haven't been doing a good job of taking care of you. I'm the human, I'm supposed to do what you can't.'   
  
Jaamies looked down. 'I know you're not really ashamed of me.'   
  
'I am learning that one of the things you need from me is to regulate...' He thought of the tidal wave of emotion Jaamies had no way of stopping. 'All of that.'   
  
'I'll do better. I'll ask before it gets so bad.'   
  
Kimi pulled him close, clutching the warm body to him and feeling his calm spread through Jaamies.   
  
'Who was that man?'   
  
'My brother.' The lack of reaction prompted an explanation. 'He is my sire and dam's other colt. We grew up in the same house, and we raced.'   
  
'Like a teammate you share a bloodline with?'   
  
'Yeah. An all-time teammate.'   
  
'What is his Racing Driver like?'   
  
'I haven't ever seen him.' He pulled a fresh towel and dried his partner's face off.   
  
'You don't go to his races?'   
  
'I am here with you.'   
  
Jaamies reached out and wrapped his hand around Kimi's forearm. 'I am here with you, too.'   
  
There was a furtive knock on the door.   
  
"It's me," Rami called.   
  
Kimi let him in, as he passed, Rami put his hand on Kimi's shoulder, lowered his voice. "What's his name?"   
  
"Jaamies." Kimi did the gesture as well. He took the snack bag from his brother and tossed the gym bag to his Driver.   
  
Rami smirked. "Iceman." He gestured, [Hello, Iceman, I am Rami.]

[Hello Rami,] Jaamies gestured one handed. [Kimi's all-time teammate.]  
  
"What's yours named?" Kimi asked.  
  
"Elava."   
  
Kimi looked at the neatly folded clothes on top of the gym bag; white shorts, white shirt, and white shoes he'd bought for Jaamies. "Let me guess what color he wears."   
  
Rami laughed.   
  
Jaamies started stripping out of his fireproof pants.   
  
Rami turned away politely, and laughed. "He's a Racing Driver all right."   
  
Kimi didn't bother. Privacy was less of an issue with someone who could hear your thoughts.   
  
Rami looked at Kimi's face. "You two don't look a lot alike."   
  
Kimi shrugged. "No one notices. Does Elava look like you?"   
  
Rami nodded. He started to say something, then paused.   
  
Kimi waited for him until he started again.   
  
Jaamies realized he'd put his normal clothes on and was still wearing his racing shoes. He sat down to untie them.   
  
"I always wondered why you were in the car that day. I never thought this was why. Stupid in retrospect. Well, it will be fun competing when you get to your rally team."   
  
Kimi looked down. Rami had a Driver, but he had been recruited to a rally team. He was going to pay the same price and never get the same benefits.   
  
"What, what's wrong?"   
  
"We're not going to a rally team. We have to go do a year for another team before we go to the team that...bought us."   
  
"Oh, I had to do that, too. Don't worry. What team are you gonna end up at?"   
  
"McLaren." Kimi said softly.   
  
He waited for disappointment and jealousy to turn his brother away from him.   
  
It took a moment until there was a reaction.   
  
Rami's eyebrows went up. He mouthed the team name. He looked at Jaamies. "He's that fast?! You're going to Formula 1?! By god, Kimi, you're going to Formula 1!" His eyes did the back and forth thing again. "You're going to be on a team with Mika Hakkinen! My brother!" He slapped Kimi on the arm. "This is fantastic! McLaren can't help but win with TWO fast Finns."   
  
Jaamies revved appreciatively and stamped into his shoe.   
  
He felt bewildered by his brother's reaction. For several reasons. He elected to nit-pick. "I don't think Jaamies is actually Finnish?" That made him wonder if Mika's Racing Driver counted as Finnish. Did Racing Drivers get citizenship by match or by location of birth? Well, of course, legally they didn't have citizenship, any more than racehorses did. If there was a Finnish Racing Driver, though, it was Mika's. "Aren't you mad?"   
  
"Well, you deserve to be in Ferrari, but I can't say that McLaren is something to sneeze at."   
  
"Aren't you mad that they didn't pick you, too?"   
  
"Oh. That's what you meant. No. Elava doesn't like grip. He would be miserable in F1. He loves rally." His big smile faded. He looked at his brother for a moment. He'd always had a good read on what was going on with him. "I wouldn't see all the attention as a positive. It's going to be bigger stakes for you, but you're going to have to give a lot more. I wouldn't have thought it would be your thing, either." He was starting to sound like he was questioning it.   
  
Kimi was frowning.   
  
Rami turned partway to the Racing Driver and then back. "Kimi, you...I thought you changed your mind about hockey."   
  
Kimi flinched like Rami had slapped him in the face.   
  
Rami's face went pale. "Oh my god. You don't want to be here."   
  
Kimi grimaced and twitched his head like he was shaking something off. "I wouldn't trade him," he grated. "And I can't go back."   
  
He'd learned a lot today. One thing was more important than all the others. He reached out to Jaamies for help.   
  
His Racing Driver was pressed against him instantly. Kimi pressed his face to his partner's cheek and closed his eyes. He waited for his own silent tears to stop. He would choke them back later, but this one time, he would let himself feel them. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	4. Rookie Year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Michael Schumacher, Fernando Alonso, Jensen Button, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Rookie Year**  
 **Sepang International Race Circuit, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia- 2001**   
  
The pre-dawn light was grey/green filtered through the low, thick, rolling clouds when the first garage door rose. It had only been in the last 20 minutes that the rain had died down to a spitting drizzle. There was enough fog that the far side of the track was visible, but not much beyond. The first trickle of crewmen in their brightly-coloured team parkas, or the more somber colours of the track and FIA officials, had foggy lanes to themselves. The sun rose lazily, unheeded into the opaque sky.   
  
The drivers had left their motorhomes and joined their entourages for their walks of the track. The small clusters of men left wide spaces between groups and spoke in low tones, when they spoke at all.   
  
As the sky lightened, the trickle of people became a steady stream. The earliest fans had claimed seats. They sat in determined groupings under blankets and umbrellas, wrapped in parkas and hats, all in team colours. The standing water had run off or dried somewhat after the rain had stopped entirely. Now the pit lane was alive with scurrying men, revving engines, and machinery.   
  
Walking down the pit lane, greeting the Racing Drivers as he went, Kimi was passing the Ferrari garage when he sent a tentative greeting to the Racing Driver in the number one car, and felt nothing. He almost missed a step. Ahead, in the second garage, Barichello's Racing Driver was perfectly accessible. The driver he couldn't touch hauled himself out of the car and Kimi slowed to watch. He could touch every Racing Driver he'd ever met. He could touch every Racing Driver in the Paddock. There were 22, just like there were supposed to be. Then he realized that 21 of them were in their garages, and one was further away from the track. He reached out and touched the one in the Ferrari motorhome.   
  
It was very surprised to hear him. Shoe wanted to know what he was doing.   
  
He sent a picture of what he was seeing in the Ferrari garage.   
  
Shoe sent back a wave of unfiltered adoration. Shoe loved Michael so much. He was happy that Michael was getting a turn to drive.   
  
This time Kimi did miss a step.   
  
Matches didn't drive. He stared at the man standing beside the number one Ferrari.   
  
Someone walked up behind him.   
  
"Very business-like, Raikkonen, staring at him like a teenage girl."   
  
He turned. Fernando Alonso had his hands on his hips, a cocky grin on his face. Behind him was Jenson Button, friendly smile and all. They were bundled in their team parkas, as though it was snowing and not just foggy. Jenson's hands were deep in his pockets.   
  
He'd spent less time talking to the other rookies' Racing Drivers than the veterans. The rookies were still overwhelmed by the newness of the paddock and the F1 life; Kimi was just one novelty among many. For the older Drivers, who were more isolated, who'd spent years speaking only with their matches and the rest of the paddock, a human who could speak to them was a deeper shock, and a more welcome distraction. Mika Hakkinen's Lentaa and Jean Alesi's Je actively sought him out during downtime. He didn't know much about Alondra and Sugarboy.   
  
He shook his head at Fernando, not going to rise to the taunt. He sent out a question to Alondra. Alondra, who lived up to his name, flitted around from subject to subject for a while, and then eventually came back to the subject at hand. He sent Kimi a picture. Internally, Kimi smiled. He changed the subject. "I have been thinking about tattoos." He pointed at one of the crew in the Ferrari garage, the edge of a tattoo was just showing from beneath his sleeve. "Do you like tattoos?"   
  
Fernando's face lit up. He started talking about his fascination with Samurai. Kimi stood impassively and listened to him. Jenson stepped forward and made a few comments.   
  
He felt Shoe's mind draw close to his and a quiet feeling of being impressed, second hand, through another set of eyes. He looked up into the Ferrari garage and into Schumacher's gaze.   
  
There was more to the Paddock than racing, he was coming to realize. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	5. Brotherhood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Mika Hakkinen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Brotherhood**  
 **McLaren Main Training Facility (McLaren Stables)- 2002**   
  
The snow was dropping from a black sky, reflecting orange light from the building's external lights. It looked more like slow falling corn flakes than snow. Kimi walked across the packed snow in the parking lot to the two men who were standing outside the door to the building where Kimi had first met Jaamies. He had reached out when he'd turned the car off the road, stretching so hard to touch his partner's mind inside the building that he'd nearly driven off the slippery driveway. Now he held the contact fiercely, like holding hands with a lover over a barrier, gradually becoming closer and closer.   
  
The two men nodded at him. His manager gestured at the taller man in the white coat. "Mika, allow me to formally introduce Kimi Raikkonen. Since he's done with his probationary period at Sauber, we're happy to be welcoming him on to the McLaren team. Kimi, this is Mika, he's going to be showing you the ropes."   
  
They'd met before, of course, but this was real. When Kimi shook Mika's hand, when he felt the strength through their two pairs of gloves, it was Kimi being initiated into the McLaren brotherhood. After a year of working his ass off in the pit for Sauber, he was… going to work his ass off in the pit for McLaren. But now, hopefully, the explanations due in his contract would be coming.   
  
He'd been given a basic course in how to work with Jaamies before they'd bonded. He knew it was a generic sort of thing, because he'd seen his brother practicing gestures around the house before he'd left home for England. He and his brother had never discussed the deal they'd each made, separately, in the car that day. Rami's deal had been different than Kimi's – Rami's racing driver would earn money, just never as much as Jaamies. He'd never seen his brother's Racing Driver, and couldn't have discussed it anyway, but he'd seen the changes in Rami after that day. He'd become quieter,more introspective, and more protective.   
  
He'd seen the changes in himself, too. He'd worked through the kinks over the 2 years in single seat and the 1 at Sauber, but this was graduation, this was when the real work would begin. He was here for Mika to teach him how to get the absolute best performance out of Jaamies.   
  
His manager left them at the door and Kimi followed Mika, both Finns silent, into the building. They entered a large gymnasium and stopped. The room had a high ceiling and was lined on either side with storage rooms, set off from the main room with white painted, wooden doors. Kimi kept his eyes on Mika, never acknowledging that he knew his Racing Driver was standing patiently, arms folded, behind the third door on the right hand side of the gym.   
  
"Go get him out." Mika had stopped several steps in front of Kimi, arms crossed in imitation of their Racing Drivers, a gesture that all matches adopted unconsciously. When Kimi walked past him, in entirely the wrong direction, thinking to affect a random search, Mika put one hand out to his chest to stop him and looked down at him from the corner of his eye.   
  
He raised an eyebrow. Kimi stared at him with that loose facial expression he still practiced every day. The room smelled of wooden floors and old varnish.   
  
Mika's eyes bored into him. He was giving him a hard stare; it made the hairs on the back of Kimi's neck rise. No games, Mika's eyes said.   
  
Mika tilted his head slightly. His eyes flicked to the wall of cupboards. He moved his hand away.   
  
Kimi took a hesitant step into the gym, not on a direct course to Jaamies' location, more towards the left wall. Mika growled, just a tiny bit, low in his throat. Kimi turned towards the right wall. He didn't show his shakiness. Mika knew. That was what this whole secret training thing was about. He'd proven his secret keeping ability, and now McLaren would allow what it never would at other times. Acknowledgement of what the Racing Drivers really were, and what they could really do.   
  
Walking straight to Jaamies and sliding the door open was strange, though. Not pretending in front of Mika was strange. Kimi was not entirely clear of what was expected of him and he walked, with Jaamies close on his heels, to a door on the other side of the room, opened it, and let out Mika's Racing Driver as well.   
  
He could barely hear Mika breathe the words. "Not possible."   
  
Kimi turned and looked at Mika from between the two grey-suited Racing Drivers. "You said to get him. How was I to know which one you meant?"   
  
"How did you know Lentaa was there?" Mika demanded, then gestured at his Racing Driver, [I told you not to tell Iceman where you were.]   
  
Lentaa backed up a step and threw both hands out, denying responsibility.   
  
Kimi felt like he was being dropped in the freezing Baltic Sea again. He had slipped up big time. Jaamies stepped up and grabbed the back of his arm firmly, sending solidarity. Kimi looked at Lentaa.   
  
'Why doesn't Mika know that I would know where you are?' he sent.   
  
Lentaa's eyes flicked to Mika, who was striding across the room towards Kimi. He pushed into Kimi's head that, as far as he knew, no Racing Driver could talk to any human except for their match, and Kimi. They could all hear Kimi.   
  
He hadn’t known it was so clear cut. Racing Drivers and their matches were so private, he’d just thought, when the Drivers were surprised to hear him, that it was the natural standoffishness of the matches. That had seemed to be borne out by none of them speaking to Jaamies. It hadn’t occurred to him that no one else COULD.   
  
Mika was standing over him now. He wasn't that much taller, but he was much broader and more heavily muscled, and he had the weight of experience behind him. His face was red, and his frown was frightening. "Lentaa disobeyed me and told Iceman where to find him," he said, and Kimi's eyes widened in shock at the outright lie. "I'll have to deal with him later for this..." Mika looked at the Racing Driver who stood facing him, as close to identical to him as any twins Kimi had ever seen. "...This deception. Later." He turned back to Kimi, and Lentaa slid understanding into Kimi's head that he was never, never to mention this again, not even in sessions like these, where a man's communication with his own Racing Driver might be tentatively acknowledged. Never to let on that he could talk to others, never let on that others could even see him.   
  
"Now, that you've shown you can find your partner, though, and get him to persuade mine to give away his location, we will move on to the more difficult exercises." He pulled a blindfold out of his bag and his hands were shaking so badly he could barely tie it around Kimi's head.   
  
Lentaa sent to him again. Mika was frightened for Kimi. The fear flowed through Lentaa's bond with Mika and into Kimi so overwhelmingly that Jaamies had to start diverting some of the connection.   
  
Kimi reached up and grabbed Mika's wrists. He poured calm into Lentaa to pass on to Mika. He sent Lentaa confidence, and had Jaamies boost what he was sending, until Mika's Adam's apple stopped jumping.   
  
"What is your Racing Driver's name?" Mika asked him.   
  
"Iceman. Yours is Lentaa? Good name." Kimi shifted his head, but couldn't see any visibility at the edges of the blindfold.   
  
"Yes, thank you, he lives up to it. Now ask Iceman to tell you what color this is." Kimi hadn't tapped into Jaamies' vision, assuming it would be cheating to do so, but he did now.   
  
Mika had pulled an orange plastic triangle about 3 inches on the long side out of his bag and was holding it up.   
  
"They are good at identifying color, as we know,"   
  
"It's an orange tangram triangle," Kimi interrupted him.   
  
Mika huffed. He fished two more shapes out of his bag. "And now what shape am I holding?"   
  
"Blue square right hand, small red triangle left."   
  
"You've got the visuals down, what about audio?"   
  
"Yes," Kimi said. "And touch and taste and smelling."   
  
"What if I were to ask you how he spent the last day you were apart?"   
  
"He was in the damned cupboard, they fed him twice, and he made the same lap time three in a row out of..." Kimi paused. "… 23 laps of the long track."   
  
"Did he count the laps or remember them individually?"   
  
"He counted them. He just doesn't know more than 5."   
  
"Yes, they understand a base 5 number system, instead of a base 10. How far back can he remember?"   
  
Lentaa sent that Mika felt it was incredible that Jaamies was one of the Racing Drivers who could count. Lentaa confided in Kimi that he, too, could count. It surprised Kimi a little that Lentaa was going to carry on talking to him of his own accord, despite Mika's misgivings.   
  
Jaamies sent that the Racing Drivers wouldn't be very willing to give him up. They hadn't given his ability away so far, because they WEREN'T willing to give him up.   
  
'Why is that?' Kimi sent. Mika carried on with tests that Kimi and Jaamies could have passed with one of them asleep, or across the length of a noisy, crowded GP racetrack. Kimi kept giving him short answers using Jaamies' senses, or letting Jaamies use his senses to pass on information to Lentaa and from Lentaa to Mika.   
  
Jaamies thought about being alone in the cupboard all day. Then he thought about being taken out to the track for training, how the other team Racing Drivers were there, in person, not just faceless minds behind walls, and there was driving and interacting with others of their kind. Each team, though, was fielding only two main Racing Drivers and a couple test Drivers or backups. The Racing Drivers were all aware of the stables where the teams kept the stock, the breeding or young, or retired Racing Drivers, and the Racing Drivers the team owned who didn't have a seat that season. All of them had grown up in one of the team stables, and many had been there at least once since. Jaamies and Lentaa had both been born out of McLaren's prize bloodline.   
  
Kimi stopped answering Mika's question mid-sentence. He'd become suddenly aware that Lentaa was the pinnacle of McLaren's breeding program, and thus Jaamies had been expected to be great as well. There was an undercurrent to this knowledge – it felt like the time his brother had given him a pack of playing cards with no jack of clubs and he had played solitaire unsuccessfully for an hour before he'd realized it.   
  
He started answering Mika's question again, but now he was looking at Lentaa, following the line of his jaw, the rise of his cheekbones, his hairline, and the shape of his eyes. The Racing Driver looked like Mika; he even had the same green eyes as Mika, the same white-blond hair. Jaamies didn't look as much like Kimi as Lentaa looked like Mika. Kimi's eyes were more blue/grey than green. Jaamies's eyes were green.   
  
Kimi felt himself sending a careful question to Jaamies. Had there been another Racing Driver in the stables that had been matched when Jaamies had? Who might look similar to Jaamies?   
  
Jaamies sent a picture of a Racing Driver who, indeed, looked very much like Rami. Not much like Kimi and Jaamies.   
  
Kimi ignored Mika's question and sat down on the floor against the wall. "I need a break," he said sullenly. He had known that this stage in his career would give him more answers for the rapidly multiplying list of questions he had. But who knew he'd get the number one question answered the first day?   
  
He knew why they'd taken his future from him and forced him into virtual slavery, and he was right, it had been motivated by money. Of course they had high hopes for another talented colt from the pairing that produced the pinnacle of the McLaren bloodline. There was an incredible amount of money to be made over the next several years if Jaamies was even a fraction the Driver Lentaa was. Why would McLaren pass up another legacy like Mika Hakkinen? Why would they let him walk away and leave them without a face for Lentaa's brother?   
  
Mika sat beside him on the floor with his arms on his knees. Lentaa crouched down beside him and leaned into him, in a way very similar to the way that Jaamies had knelt and pressed himself close to Kimi's side.   
  
Mika looked at him, an unsurprised expression in his eyes. "You'd never seen the ranches, had you? Not until just now."   
  
Kimi had first seen Jaamies in a room in this building, never a… Racing Driver farm. Since Kimi had bonded with him, Jaamies had never had another handler for more than small chores. On track the Racing Drivers were never abused or manhandled – the public would have noticed. He'd never seen a Racing Driver on a lead stick.   
  
The two Racing Drivers, used to being ignored while their matches spoke to other humans, crossed their arms and proceeded to have a staring contest.   
  
"I wanted to play hockey," Kimi said.   
  
Mika nodded.   
  
Lentaa nodded - all his match had ever wanted to do was drive. When it had become apparent that was never going to happen to the degree he'd have liked, it had seemed like a blessing that McLaren showed up in his life with Lentaa. It had taken them years to figure out that the downward turn of Mika’s career had been engineered to make him willing to accept the alternative.   
  
"Now I have to keep doing this, or Iceman won't get to drive. What happens one day when… I never even wanted to be here."   
  
"There are other options. No one can drive forever. Some drivers contract with their teams to move to the lower racing classes, some of them contract with their teams to stable their match and they commentate, some of them contract to put their matches out to pasture, and some of them find ways to stay with the team, somehow. I'm going to be retiring, soon. I'm going to consult, and Lentaa and I are going to keep working."   
  
Kimi looked at Mika. He couldn't retire. He'd been driving since Kimi was a child. He was a touchstone of the racing world. Schumacher was sure never going to retire, how could Mika?   
  
"You and Iceman, with that talent of yours, you could go work at the stables. There would never be a lack of use for you there. Train new Racing Drivers, find matches. Find them earlier, so their lives aren't so disrupted when the choice is made for them."   
  
Kimi nodded. If he'd been approached at 14, he'd have tripped over himself for a chance to do this job, before the reality kicked in. He was only vaguely aware of what happened at the stables. He knew the Racing Drivers didn't like it, that they mourned when one of the Paddock Drivers was sent there, and that they welcomed those who returned with care and a little fear, as though they might go feral or burst into tears at any moment. He asked Jaamies, but not Lentaa, if the stables would be a good place for them. Jaamies hesitated.   
  
He understood Kimi's question, but didn't want to be at the stables. He thought it would make the Racing Drivers' lives much easier for Kimi to be there, but he didn't want to go. He didn't want to see it. He didn't want to be around it.   
  
Kimi asked if he wouldn't like to help train young Racing Drivers and help them find their matches.   
  
Jaamies didn't understand that question at all.   
  
Of course he didn't want to help train Racing Drivers. He certainly did not want any part of finding matches, of putting them through the bonding. Kimi felt his skin shiver as though he'd had cold grease dripped on him.   
  
No, Jaamies didn't WANT to do that.   
  
But Jaamies could see how much easier it would be for those trained, matched and bound, with Kimi there, than going through it alone.   
  
He'd felt the cool, solid calmness of Kimi before they'd even bonded. He'd felt the mind and the heart behind the blue eyes, even before he'd seen those eyes. Kimi felt Jaamies press himself against his side. He had been afraid, before he'd felt what was coming for him. Too afraid to move, too afraid to fight, too afraid that what was coming through the door would... would hate him, would envy him, would resent him and make every moment an agony to touch.   
  
Jaamies had felt the nameless longing just like every other Racing Driver, for some place cold and slick and shot through with speed, some place safe. He believed that place was Kimi. Kimi's mind was like coming home. Instead of fire and hatred, Kimi was cool, smooth acceptance. He would do anything for Kimi, even working in the stables.   
  
Kimi would do anything to keep Jaamies, even forwarding FIA’s designs. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	6. Beginner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Beginner**  
 **FIA Global Training Facility (FIA Stables)- 2006**  
  
The weather was cold, even for midwinter. The last week had broken records. It was Spain, though, and the weather was never so bad as to make Kimi look twice. He walked along the terrace, to the door on the far side. The stable was a big sweeping building that mimicked a villa. Of course the stable outside Monaco was a stylish bit of master architecture. It was surprising it wasn't some underwater glass dome at the bottom of the bay, frankly.  
  
Monaco had a stable, it was unique, and it held a lot of the Racing Drivers whose teams had gone under, or whose title was contested. It was where the Racing Drivers who were driving in the Spanish GP were stabled.  
  
This was winter, though. It was Kimi's final year in his Trainer apprenticeship. Jaamies had been brought here separately, and was feeding Kimi a thread of concern through their connection, from somewhere deep inside the building. He hadn't seen Jaamies in weeks. The tension inside him was dissolving as they got closer together.  
  
Pierre met him at the door and opened it with the keycard from around his neck. "It's good to see you again, Kimi. We'll go get Iceman. I apologize that I had to call you out here so suddenly, but this is a rare opportunity, and I think your training will benefit greatly from observing this."  
  
Kimi followed FIA's Master of apprentice Training down a hallway barnacled with art. He had met Pierre several times, but most of his studies were under Mika and the other Trainers at the McLaren stable, and next year at Ferrari, he'd study under Niki and Michael.  
  
"I think you're something special, Kimi."  
  
Kimi's heart jumped a little when he said this. Did he know about what he and Jaamies could do?  
  
"I know you don't really have an affinity for the medical aspect of this job, but I have seen your work and read your reports and I think you and Iceman will be excellent at taking care of the mental health of our patients. I want you to focus your training on that."  
  
There was a tall, white suited Racing Driver standing dead center in the room, arms crossed, helmet slumped, waiting, when the door opened and Pierre and his partner, Brou, walked in. Kimi and Jaamies shuffled to the side.  
  
The young Driver looked from Brou to Jaamies and shook his head. He sent them a feeling, a Driver, realizing he was unable to beat the Driver chasing him, and intentionally turning his kart to the side, taking them both off the track. The traitorous Driver had at the same time both their faces  
  
Kimi sent only to Jaamies an image of a Driver pull himself out of his wrecked car and pushing away the marshals who tried to help him. Opposing the people who tried to help you was a good indication that something was out of alignment.  
  
Brou, not aware of the pair carrying on behind him, asked the young one, whose call name was 5B, because not every registration number suggested a name and not every Driver picked one up, if he wanted to drive today.  
  
5B shook his head. 'I am not driving for them. What good will it do? Those karts will never be able to give me what I need.'  
  
'It hurts more to use them than not use them?' Kimi sent, careful to keep the question straight to 5B.  
  
5B didn't look at him. 'Yes.'  
  
'And that is all there is, then? This isn't good enough so there is no point in trying for more?'  
  
'I have used every kart, there is nothing more.'  
  
Kimi looked at Jaamies. 'Go easy on him.'  
  
Jaamies closed his eyes and found and handed 5B a memory, in the beautiful, complete detail that Racing Drivers experienced things, of his first single seat racecar.  
  
5B's posture changed, and then he slumped again. 'This is not on the track, you are imagining this.'  
  
Jaamies sent him his first track walk of Melbourne. No need to start out too big.  
  
5B couldn't make the car he'd been shown make sense on the track he'd been shown.  
  
'There are better things out there than karts. There are better things out there than that car. Would that be worth trying for?' Kimi sent.  
  
Jaamies sent him, not the actual content, but the emotion of a new track every few weeks, and a car he knew like the inside of his match's mind.  
  
5B shrugged. 'The same car would get boring, and how could you really fall in love with a track if you only drove it a few days?'

Jaamies was taken aback. How could you achieve perfect sympatico with a car if it was a different car all time? It was bad enough when the team kept rebuilding the same car. Besides, it was easy to memorize a track. Jaamies barely bothered with track walks.

5B made a sad face when Jaamies said he didn't do track walks.  
  
Pierre and Brou were still keeping up their own conversation with 5B.  
  
Kimi and Jaamies asked some more questions, and talked to 5B about the tracks they had visited. He seemed overwhelmed by the idea of Melbourne, and when Kimi had mentioned Suzuka, he had become overawed. It seemed too much to talk about Spa or Monaco.  
  
When they left the young Driver, Kimi said quietly to Pierre, "He's never going to get a chance to race, is he?"  
  
Pierre shook his head. "Some of them are track motivated, instead of car motivated. As you can see, he loves driving just as much, but he would never perform, travelling from track to track. He might have had a real future as a track expert, they are a necessary part of the business, and they are in high demand. He never will, now, though. We had his intended match here, studying to handle him, but the boy died in an accident a few weeks ago. With no one to ever bond to, he's got no future."  
  
"We'll keep him for another year, ship him out to a holding facility, see if the facial recognition programs can find another match, but the odds of finding someone suitable at this stage are non-existent. There's not enough payoff getting someone in with no history of driving, or doing surgery to make him match someone, not when he'll only ever be a single track driver. Still, we don't get very many like him through here, and I thought you should get the chance to see him before you start your residency at Ferrari this year."  
  
He talked about the differences in track motivated Drivers. Kimi and Jaamies had met the track expert at the Pista De Fiorano, Ferrari's home track. He was a little, skinny, triangular faced Driver named Scarlet, after Ferrari and Italy's national racing color. He did 3 track walks every day, and when he told a Driver something about Fiorano, they listened. It was like being handed a diamond.  
  
At home, days later, Kimi looked up 5B's match. It was tricky, given that he hadn't been told the name, but he knew he had to have been a driver, and he knew about the age range, and the time. He found the newspaper article about the man, Steppe Vandoorne. He'd been 19, home from the stable for the holidays, and he had died saving his younger brother, who'd fallen through the ice on a frozen lake.  
  
Kimi arranged an anonymous donation for a full scholarship for the surviving boy. Two lives had been given so that Stoffel Vandoorne could live; he needed to be able to make the best of it. How surprised Kimi was when that same boy showed up on the paddock several years later, matched and standing next to one of Lentaa's sons. It only made sense, though; even death wouldn't keep the company from taking what it was owed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	7. You're Not Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Felipe Massa, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- You're Not Alone**  
 **Shanghai International Circuit, Shanghai, China- 2007**  
  
The weather was cold again. That, at least was a relief. Interviews were just about like being waterboarded, and standing in his jumpsuit in the beating sun answering the same 10 stupid questions would have been like having fiery brands burning off his fingernails. At least he had someone to talk to. Jaamies was well within Kimi's range, so were the two Racing Drivers from the Toro Rosso team, the other Racing Driver from Ferrari, and a few he didn't know immediately. The rookie's little blonde Racing Driver was telling Kimi jokes. It was getting difficult to keep a straight face. He was only half listening to the reporter in front of him.  
  
He sent a joke back to Sunshine. A ways down the pit lane, the rookie put his hand over his mouth and laughed into it. Kimi looked up and frowned. Then he frowned more when the rookie stole the joke and repeated it to the reporter interviewing him. How Brazen.  
  
One of the Racing Drivers, Kimi couldn't tell who, only that he was standing close by, sent another joke to Kimi and the other Racing Drivers. Most of them were listening from back rooms off garages, or in team motorhomes nearby. A ripple of amusement ripped through the listening Drivers and Kimi saw smiles flicker on a couple of the other matches' faces. Not Felipe, though; his little Mancha was just audible singing to himself at the edge of Kimi's mind, and he was not paying attention to the other Drivers.  
  
The McLaren in the paddock had a huge smirk on his face, Kimi suspected it was his Driver who'd made the joke. It was followed by another, even funnier, and Kimi answered the interviewer's question absentmindedly. He realized the reporter wasn't saying anything back, and he looked at her.  
  
"Could you repeat that in English, Kimi?" she asked.  
  
He spun out another answer about how the team was going to have to work hard and keep doing well in the next race. She nodded and thanked him for the interview, and he walked away down the line of garages, step lightening as he went, as though he'd tipped a lorry off his shoulders and left it behind him.  
  
He crossed through the Ferrari garage, greeting the crew as he passed. He walked into the room behind the garage where Jaamies and Mancha were standing, arms crossed, ignoring one another, Jaamies talking to the other Racing Drivers, and Mancha off in his own world. Again. Kimi sighed. This was too much of this. He leaned against the door, so he'd have plenty of warning of approach, and gestured to Mancha.  
  
[Look here.] He had to repeat his gesture before the Driver looked at him. The singing in his head quieted, but didn't stop. It was some sort of Brazilian lullaby. [Where is Felipe?]  
  
The red helmet dipped. The singing rose in insistence. Kimi stepped forward. He could feel Mancha's loneliness, but Racing Drivers didn't like being touched by humans that weren't their matches, even if it was another human they could talk to. Mancha had been self-comforting more and more this season, singing to himself, or sitting as long as would possibly be allowed in the car, or wedging himself into tight spaces and watching with hawk eyes. If Jaamies were this upset, Kimi would have his arms around him, petting him and telling him what he needed to hear to feel better. He would figure out how to fix the problem, and start working on it. He wouldn't be on the pit lane giving interviews.  
  
[Please ask Felipe to come down here.]  
  
Mancha responded that Felipe wasn't listening; he'd closed him out of his mind. Kimi's eyes widened in shock. At that moment the doorknob turned and Kimi stepped neatly away from the door before it opened.  
  
Felipe walked in. The room was only about 8 feet in any direction – there wasn't much space to move away – and everything was immediately in view. He stared at Kimi, at Jaamies, who had his helmet tilted and his arms crossed, and at Mancha, who still had his arms crossed, but now had his helmet on his chest and his shoulders hunched. "What are you doing to my Racing Driver?"  
  
Kimi shrugged. "Nothing, he was like this when I came in." He looked at Jaamies as if for confirmation, but the Racing Driver just shifted as if allowing a light weight to fall from his shoulders. "Did he say we did something?"  
  
Felipe hesitated. He threw back his shoulders. "I'm in charge. He does what I say. I don't let him take control, and I make my own judgments about what to do."  
  
Kimi didn't know what that had to do with it, so he just looked at him.  
  
Felipe tried to stare him down. Like a man under threat of being run over -very slowly- by a glacier but unwilling to turn and run.  
  
But when Kimi did not give way, at last his shoulders slumped.  
  
"Michael said he would race better if I indulged him. He does not," Felipe snarled.  
  
Out of the corner of his eye, Kimi saw Mancha flinch.  
  
"I should be out there. I would be winning."  
  
"Matches don't drive," Kimi said.  
  
Felipe's head came up. His eyes were blazing. His jaw was tight. "That's what they say, isn't it? You know who was in the damned cockpit half the time? Michael! Ferrari let him drive. When I found out, I thought they'd let me drive, too. I am as good a driver as HE—" he flung his arm out at Mancha, who was now less crossing his arms and more hugging himself, "— ever will be." The singing was as loud as a scream in Kimi's head. "If it hadn't been for HIM, I'd be here on my own."  
  
Kimi turned his head slightly to the side to listen as Jaamies sent a picture of Felipe winning races before being found to match with Mancha. He looked back.  
  
The other man was glaring at his Racing Driver, who was turned partly away, shoulders drawn up, like he was trying to shield himself. "Of course Michael could encourage his, his won everything. His wasn't a second rate piece of trash, an anchor around his neck."  
  
"The anchor keeps the ship safe," Kimi murmured.  
  
Felipe raised a fisted hand, face and body twisted with rage. Kimi wondered if he was going to try to hit him. Instead he turned and swung his fist towards Mancha. Jaamies stepped in front of Mancha before it struck, catching Massa's fist. Kimi's hands came up from his sides. The reflection of Felipe's rage in Jaamies' visor turned to shock, then a flicker of fear, and back to rage.  
  
"Jaamies," Kimi called to him through a dry throat. He pointed at the ground next to him; index finger extended only a bit more than the others. Said it aloud, for Felipe's benefit, because with Mancha in the state he was in, Kimi didn't think Felipe would be particularly capable of understanding the fine points of the gesture. "Come here, it will be alright. Leave them alone." Jaamies touching Felipe could turn into a dangerous-animal-gets-put-down situation very easily, if Felipe decided to be vindictive about this. He held his open palms at Felipe. Even a human would understand the stop gesture.  
  
He brushed Jaamies' shoulders, squeezing his biceps. "I'm sorry. I should have stopped before it went that far. Are you alright?"  
Jaamies tilted his helmet and shuffled again.  
  
Kimi turned back to Felipe. "You are his handler. If your handling methods are making him a better racer, that is for the best. We all have to do everything we can. We," he nodded to include Jaamies in the gesture, "will not interfere with how you chose to treat your partner."  
Felipe sneered. He gave Mancha a shove and walked out of the room.  
  
Kimi stepped towards the little Racing Driver. He was even shorter than his handler. The red helmet turned away. Kimi stood in front of him for a moment. He raised his hand. Sent an offer. The helmet turned farther away, and the singing rose in determination. Kimi dropped his hand. He looked over his shoulder at Jaamies.  
  
The singing cut out suddenly as Jaamies cut off Kimi's connection to Mancha.  
  
Kimi walked to the other corner of the room and sat with his back to the little red suited figure. He and Jaamies sat side by side and went over their race for the next day. Farther away, Kimi could hear the general chatter of the happy Racing Drivers, glad to be near enough to their colleagues to converse freely, to share with others who could appreciate the level at which they competed.  
  
Happy to be here, doing what they loved best, with the ones they loved best.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	8. I'm Like You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Sebastian Vettel, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- I'm Like You**  
 **Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Montreal, Canada- 2008**  
  
Fernando thought he was hot shit. Hot shit was about right, Kimi thought. Fernando made such a big deal out of "ending Schumacher's reign." Kimi had put a short stop to Alonso's reign, though, and put Ferrari right back on top. Ferrari had been very appreciative. They were quite proud of their new all-star driver/Trainer combination.  
  
Kimi sat in the rain with the hood of his coat up and his earphones in, listening to music. The purpose was usually to keep people from talking to him, and usually he just kept them in and listened to the people around him talk. When there was no one around, though, there was no reason not to have music on. He was sitting on one of the fences that separated the public area from the service area. It was made of horizontal metal pipes and he was sitting on one with his arms braced on the ones above. The pipes were wet, but so was everything. He was staring out at a spot to the side of the grandstand, not really looking at anything, just brooding. The public area wasn't open yet, and the press hadn't spotted him, the Racing Drivers were quiet, getting themselves ready for what was likely to be a weekend of running in the pouring rain, even Jaamies was preoccupied, sitting alone in a darkened room back in the motor home, getting himself into the right mindset.  
  
Kimi sensed someone walking behind him and glanced over his shoulder. It was the rookie with the sweet blond Driver. The one Jaamies never called by name, just sent an impression of warm sunshine. The Driver was fast, Kimi recalled. The rookie looked like he was about 13. He had a German flag on his jumpsuit.  
  
"Hey," Kimi called.  
  
The kid turned around, then went red and looked around for whoever Kimi surely must have been calling to.  
  
Kimi took his earphones out and gestured to the rookie to come over.  
  
In response, he got a gestured, [What do you want me to come over there for?]  
  
When he had been one year in F1, with his first seat just under him, he was pretty sure he wouldn't have given any of the older drivers attitude, let alone a world champ. Then again, the world champs when he'd been a rookie, well, it didn't beat thinking of defying Mika, or, he shuddered to think of it, defying Michael. He asked Jaamies to divert a moment of his attention.

'Please ask Sunshine to motivate his match to do as he is told?"  
  
The boy's eyes widened, pleasingly, and he stepped forward as if he'd been stung.  
  
Jaamies turned back to preparing for the race.  
  
The rookie's first step turned into a trot across the distance between them. When he reached Kimi he stopped, waiting for Kimi to say whatever he'd called him over to say.  
  
Which was nothing. He hadn't had anything in mind when he'd called him, just wanted to get a better idea of who he was, this rookie on his grid. He should probably think of something to say, or this would get weird. But the kid shifted and looked down at his feet, and instead Kimi decided to see what the kid would say if left to it.  
  
"How do you put a giraffe in the refrigerator?" The boy asked, looking up from the ground suddenly and smiling in a kind of manic, hopeful way. He gestured as he said this, but gestures had no words for giraffe or refrigerator. He substituted two other gestures that meant, more or less, [tall thing] and [cold thing.]  
  
"Ha?" Kimi asked, confused by the German accent and the conflicting gestures, and wondering if something had gotten lost in translation.  
  
"You open the door and push him in," the boy said in a rush. "How do you put an elephant [broad thing] in the refrigerator?"  
  
What a stupid joke. Kimi's mouth dropped open, and for the first time in a long time, it was unintentional. Through his confusion he realized the rookie was waiting for his response for the punchline of the new joke.  
  
"How many animals do you need in your refrigerator? How will they breathe? Are they already dead?"  
  
"No, you open..." The rookie frowned, he tilted his head in a half shrug and started to speak, and then stopped again. "You are supposed to say 'You open the door and push him in.'"  
  
"So you just told me the same joke twice with two different animals." The fascination watching the way he was getting flustered about Kimi ruining his joke was a little like the fascination of watching a wreck happen in front of you. You can't help but hope the guy gets out okay. Jaamies finished his work and Kimi could feel him connect to his mind and start watching what was happening.  
  
The boy put his hands on his hips and stamped one foot. "You are supposed to think that, and then I say, 'No, you take the giraffe out and push him in.'"  
  
Kimi shrugged. "It's not a very funny joke."  
  
"Yes, it is hilarious."  
  
"For you?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"To set your friend up to fail and laugh at them?"  
  
The boy closed his mouth and looked thoughtful. "Are we friends?" he said after a long pause.  
  
"Not if you keep telling jokes like that." Kimi felt his fingers wandering over and over his earphones and he looked down at them.  
  
"I know lots of better jokes." The rookie stepped closer.  
  
"Maybe no more jokes for now. I am Kimi." He held his hand out for the rookie to shake. "I am sorry, I cannot remember your name." Now that was strange, why was he apologizing for not remembering a rookie's name? Who knew if he'd even be here in a year, why bother to remember?  
  
The rookie deflated a little, but then stepped forward and shook Kimi's hand. He wasn't done growing, and his hands were smaller than they were going to be, but he had long fingers that wrapped all the way around Kimi's hand, and a grip firmer than most men.  
  
"Pleased to meet you, Kimi, I am Sebastian Vettel. I drive for Toro Rosso."  
  
Kimi looked at the way he was decked from head to toe in branded gear. "I know." He turned back to the fence and felt the confidence drain out of the boy. "You like working in the pits at Toro Rosso?"  
  
The boy climbed up on the fence right beside him, brushing against him at elbows and knees. "I don't work in the pits, I'm the new driver."  
  
Kimi turned his head slowly. "No you aren't." He looked at the rookie match implacably.  
  
"Yes, I am. Sebastian Vettel, I drive for Toro Rosso." He said it like he was reading it off a card. He'd probably practiced in the mirror.  
  
"You have a grip like you run an air gun all day." Kimi told him. He leaned on the bar and looked out toward the grandstand again.  
  
The boy flinched. Kimi had hit the target in one shot.  
  
Kimi held a hand out, palm up. He ran his thumb over a ridged callus across the pad of the palm. "Fuel line callus."  
  
The rookie jerked back so fast the fence shook. "But you're Kimi Raikkonen! You're the world champion!"  
  
Kimi put a hand out to steady the kid before he tipped the fence over and them with it. He shrugged. "I do what you do. They told you, yes?"  
  
"You...but, I've seen you get out of the car and take your helmet off."  
  
Kimi looked at him. Should this be coming as this much of a shock? He waited for the rookie to catch up to himself.  
  
"That isn't you?"  
  
"That isn't any of us. Matches don't drive."  
  
"But aren't there any men on the grid? I've never seen anyone who wasn't..." He trailed off, likely thinking through his own routine, the protocols that were in place to prevent exactly what he'd been expecting as proof.  
  
Kimi toyed with his earphones and realized they were still playing. He turned off the music.  
  
"You don't drive. You're like me, and all the other guys, they are, too." Kimi let Seb work through it. "So you have a Racing Driver. Where is he? What is he like? I thought we weren't supposed to talk about them."  
  
"You know about them, don't you? Your team knows. It is the same on on the grid."  
  
"Mine is named Sunshine." He looked at Kimi, chin jutted out like he was going to fight him if Kimi said something wrong. As though KIMI was the one who would say his Racing Driver's name was lady-like.  
  
Instead of commenting to this effect, Kimi answered his earlier questions. "Iceman is in the motor home. He is like smart and brave and" Kimi searched for a way to say he made his life happy without sounding too sentimental, but Sebastian's eyes had glowed with so much pride when he said his Racing Driver's name, and Kimi had already started down the blunt honesty road with him that he figured he may as well carry on. "He makes my heart feel so happy."  
  
Seb nodded along. "Sunny, too, he is like the best thing ever to happen. Ever at all."  
  
"So can I meet yours?"  
  
Kimi shrugged. "It's hard on race weekends. Maybe on a practice day. They don't like them out too much. You could come by the motor home sometime. I will leave a pass for you."  
  
"Thank you. That sounds good." He pulled out his phone. "When is a good time?" He started clicking through his calendar.  
  
Well that was bold. Jaamies chuckled in the back of Kimi's mind. For a second he wondered about this, but decided it didn't matter. He pulled out his phone and they started comparing schedules. Sebastian was surprised by how much fuller Kimi's schedule was than his own, the PR and factory work taking up almost all of his time. He suggested maybe there was a time Kimi could come meet Sunshine instead? That timing didn't work out, either.  
  
Kimi looked through his schedule. "Well, I won't have Iceman with me, but I have some time during winter break. Do you like badminton?"  
  
Sebastian broke into a huge grin. "I love badminton!" This would turn out to be an inadvertent truth, but not for months and months.  
  
"Good," Kimi said, marking the name Seb down in the calendar note and putting his phone away. There was the sound of someone walking past behind them. They both turned. Fernando Alonso was going by, his thumbs stuck in the straps of his backpack. He saw them looking and gave a chin jut and a jaunty wave. They both raised their hands.  
  
As Fernando walked on, they turned back to the fence.  
  
"Oh my god," Seb said, "He wishes to be your best friend SO bad." He bumped his shoulder against Kimi's and they both started to laugh.  
  
Yeah, Fernando thought he was hot shit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	9. The Night Terrors Start

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery
> 
> (In this part of the AU the timeline has been changed. The full differences are listed in Choose.)

**Chapter- The Night Terrors Start**  
 **Pista De Fiorano, Fiorano Modenese, Italy (Ferrari Winter Training Stable)- 2009**  
  
It was dark and the room was warm and cozy, the only light was the green digital clock face. 3:28. Something was wrong.  
  
Kimi sat bolt upright, checking beside him to see if Jenni was alright. Who had screamed? The bed beside him was empty and he panicked, jumping up and switching on the light before he realized Jenni was at home, not missing from his bed at the winter training flat. He looked around, still charged with adrenaline, looking for the threat.  
  
The room was totally empty, aside from him and the furniture.  
  
There was still indignant pleading pouring in from somewhere. He followed the emotion into Jaamies' mind. Only a high emotional charge could have boosted Jaamies' range so far past the distance they could normally reach. Jaamies was in his cupboard at the training stable. He kept calling for Kimi to come, calling for help. He couldn't convey what was wrong, though stomach churning car accidents kept finding their way into Kimi's mind.  
  
He pulled on a pair of pants. He got them up to his thighs before he realized they were backwards. He started over. He didn't tie his sneakers, and tripped over one of the laces going down the hallway, crashing into the wall as he pulled his shirt over his head. Pulling on his coat as he crossed the parking lot to his car was merely a reflex, a testament to years of living in a cold climate.  
  
He was in the driver's seat when the fear ebbed a little and he could think. His shoes were untied, he had bed head, and dried drool on his face, and how would it look his showing up at the track at 3 am for no apparent reason, in a panic? He leaned past the steering wheel and tied his shoes, pulled his pant legs low so it wasn't instantly obvious he wasn't wearing socks. He swished out his mouth with the water bottle from the cup holder, and used some of it to wipe his face off. He found his ski hat stuffed down the side of the passenger seat. At least now he looked like he might possibly be legitimate. While he drove, he thought up an excuse about doing night driving tests with Jaamies. The panic had settled down so that he could only hear his Racing Driver at the edge of his mind, not taking up every ounce of attention.  
  
As he got closer he picked Jaamies' mind up again. His images started to take on a flavour of memories of rattling around in a crashing car, pieces shearing off and spraying away. It still was not clear what he meant.  
  
He flashed his ID to the guard, who didn't even ask any questions. Kimi made his way down the stairs to the stable. It was a long corridor of suites. He was painfully conscious of the cameras, and forced himself to a walking pace past the suites belonging to the two test drivers and the suites where Giancarlo and Felipe's Racing Drivers lived. Jaamies was in the farthest room on the left. The suite across the hall was suspiciously empty. It was 4am; there was no good reason for that room to have no Racing Driver in it.  
  
Kimi knocked quietly on Jaamies' door, and went in. The lights were off and Jaamies was sitting on the floor in the corner behind the table. His face was red in the light spiking in from the hallway, and his entire face was wet with tears, like a small child's. Kimi closed the door behind himself. Jaamies reached both arms for Kimi; hands outspread, making grasping motions. His mouth twisted with need.  
  
Kimi ducked behind the table and knelt between Jaamies’ feet. He pulled his match close and Jaamies cried wracking sobs into his shoulder. The one time Racing Drivers sounded nearly organic was when they cried. Kimi held Jaamies until he fell asleep. He left the fitfully sleeping Racing Driver in his cupboard, and went to get some breakfast, still not knowing what had driven the panic and need for help.  
  
Until he reached the mess hall, where Michael Schumacher's accident was all over the news.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	10. Make The Deal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Mika Hakkinen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Make The Deal**  
 **Kimi Raikkonen's Flat, Fiorano Modenese, Italy- 2009**  
  
Mika was straight faced when Kimi opened the door to let him into the flat, and the boy was reminded why they'd called the man Iceman, years before Jaamies had inherited the title. He invited him to sit in the small living room, and offered him a drink. Mika sat and declined any drink but water, calm and polite, as he would be at any other time.  
  
"You know about the accident?" Kimi was so turned on edge by this whole thing that he blurted out the question with no further preamble. He collapsed into the opposite armchair, beseeching Mika, as his father had beseeched Kimi all those years before. Begging for help to make things alright, desperate enough to ask someone even closer to drowning.  
  
Mika shifted his ankle onto his knee and pinched the seam of his pant leg so it was laying straight. "Yes."  
  
"Then you've heard...how they are saying he is? The way they are saying he is?" Kimi picked up his glass and then put it back down.  
  
Mika pinched the seam in the other direction, still focused on the neatness of the line of his trouser. "Yes."  
  
Before Kimi started to speak again, Mika looked at him. Kimi's hands clenched where they curled around the arms of the chair. The face may not say much, but Kimi had years of practice watching his own face not giving much away. He could see the emotion underlying the calm.  
This was hurting Mika. He should leave it alone. Mika was far more deeply invested in this.  
  
This was hurting Mika, but it was hurting Kimi, too, and he needed advice. Mika was the only one deeply invested enough to understand and be able to offer it. "I was at the stable that night, for night training with Jaamies. Ferrari may not be very happy with me."  
  
His mentor clenched his eyes shut for a moment while he shook his head.  
  
This made Kimi more worried than anything so far.  
  
Mika took a breath and studied Kimi like there would be a quiz later. Or as if this would be the last time they would see one another. "If they haven't reacted yet, you don't need to be afraid of the same thing happening." As he spoke, his hands made half completed gestures, a habit a lot of matches found hard to lose once they were off the track. "The publicity for the sport would have been better if it had been both of you at once. Strange coincidence stuff. A week later, you'd just be lost in the news wash. They wouldn't spend you like that."  
  
"They'll do something else, then." Kimi bit the inside of his lip. They knew how little he was willing to give the media, why would he go to them, now?  
  
"If they offer you a deal, Kimi, don't fight them." Mika patted his hand firmly on the table. The gesture conveyed more than the words. Racing Drivers used it to forestall argument, the more emphatic, the more critical the situation. "They will reward you for your show of...willingness to be reasoned with."  
  
Ever since the day Kimi had gotten in that damn Mercedes, he'd been forcing down what he wanted in the face of the companies' no-way-out-deals. His life was nothing but a fucking show of "willingness to be reasoned with." A show of submission to the companies' grasping demands.  
  
Another show of giving in would be just the same. Pride became more bitter the more you swallowed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	11. Forget

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Forget**  
 **Redbull Race Training Compound (Redbull/Toro Rosso Stable)- 2009**  
  
It was 90 degrees in the shade outside the Red Bull stable. A van pulled up to the loading dock and stopped. Ignoring the handler who'd driven the van, Kimi bailed out of the passenger side, strode around to the back and climbed in. There was a wooden crate the size of a coffin laying on the hard plastic dent resistant cargo flooring. A crowbar was strapped to the wall. Kimi pulled it free and started prying the lid off the crate. It was too hot for Jaamies to be trapped in a box. When he felt for his partner's mind, there was the soft spinning sensation that was the Racing Driver equivalent of sleep. Not unconsciousness, just deep relaxation and resetting of their internal order. It was the reason they didn't need beds, just closets.  
  
When the lid lifted and the light reached him, Jaamies made his way back to the surface of consciousness. He lifted himself out of the box. Before he could realize he was in a vehicle and demand to have a drive, Kimi directed his attention towards the building. He gestured an explanation, told him they were going to hurry inside to get out of the heat. Mentally, he sent a more elaborate explanation.  
  
Jaamies put a hand to his helmet and then gave a thumbs up. Ready to go.  
  
Kimi could feel the sweat breaking out on his skin, making anywhere two parts of his body met moist and uncomfortable. Through the loading dock door at the back of the stable, it wasn't much better. A huge fan turned on as they walked through, Jaamies bridled at the sudden noise and wind, but quickly mastered the startle reaction and followed Kimi. The handler who'd chauffeured Kimi to the stable probably hadn't noticed, but the man inside had.  
  
He was a touch taller than Kimi, with wide shoulders on an otherwise skinny frame. He had dark hair. "Kimi. It's nice to meet you. I am Giancarlo Constalioga. Please call me Johnny. I'm going to oversee your residency as a Trainer. This is Iceman?" He barely glanced at the helmeted Racing Driver. When Kimi just nodded, he went on, "I have the paperwork in my office. FIA has asked me to allow you to conduct a travelling residency."  
  
He waved off the man who'd delivered Kimi and Jaamies and didn't wait to see him leave. He led the two through the storage dock. There were crates everywhere, just like the shipping and receiving department of any large company. They stopped and waited for an elevator, and rode down a floor to the highest of 4 basements, according to the elevator buttons.  
  
"Since you'll be moving from stable to stable with your rallying, you'll be supervised by the head Trainer at each stable. You'll answer to them, but I will be the one overseeing everything, and it will be my call whether you will progress to the next stages of your studies. You'll have to prove that you can meet the same requirements as a stationary resident. Don't rely on your partner's skill as a driver to get the work done."  
  
The hall the elevator opened into was cold with recycled air. Kimi's wet shirt immediately chilled against his skin. He opened his mouth to point out that Jaamies was a World Champion.  
  
"I know his record, and I know it seems like there's no Racing Driver he can't take on, but there's always a better driver. If Trainers could only handle worse Racing Drivers than theirs, then all the champions would be untrainable. What are you going to do someday when you are a full Trainer if you get called in to work with the Professor? If you rely on the record, you're going to get flattened." He opened a door into an office with walls that seemed made of filing cabinets and shelves packed with unbound papers.  
  
He took a seat in the desk chair and pointed Kimi towards the chair in front of the desk. It was wide enough for Jaamies to sit next to him, which he did, with no hesitation. Johnny opened the thick file on the top of the desk.  
  
"Being a licensed Trainer is more than being a handler. You won't need to rely on lead sticks. You'll have him to translate for you. You will also be responsible for a lot more than just moving them around; you are going to be medic, teacher, coach, therapist, and matchmaker." Johnny stared at the file for a moment.  
  
Kimi read it upside down. It was the file he had signed when he'd taken on responsibility for Jaamies all those years ago. The file he'd signed this year when FIA had sent him away from F1 to cool his heels in Rally. The sharp tug on his leash had made sure he wouldn't consider breaking ranks and running to the press. The treat offered, on the other hand, was approval of his Trainer's license so he could take Jaamies with him, unstabled. The file seemed much thicker than he remembered, though.  
  
"Now that you are learning to train other Racing Drivers, you can be considered ready to read your full file. You can't understand others if you don't fully understand your own." He turned the file around. "Read through this. When you're ready, we'll tour the stables." He left the room and closed the door quietly behind him.  
  
Kimi took the file. It was significantly thicker. It didn't just have the bare bones facts that the other two had. This one had all the performance notes made by all the Trainers and handlers who'd dealt with Jaamies since the day he was born. It was his complete medical history, including the injuries he'd sustained racing. There were reviews from their team managers and relevant engineers. There was a full lineage going back to the original herd of Racing Drivers. There was a secondary file with an uncomfortable amount of information about Kimi.  
  
Including some really unflattering pictures. Jaamies pointed at a still from the video where Kimi had fallen off the yacht.  
  
He tilted his head and looked at Kimi.  
  
Kimi closed the file. [Let's go.]  
  
Jaamies frowned. He pushed it back open. He flipped the page.  
  
Kimi reached for the file, he froze when Jaamies' helmet jerked towards him.  
  
Jaamies reached up and yanked his helmet off. His green eyes stared at Kimi for a moment, then back at the pictures. He flipped through a couple more pictures, stopped on a closeup. His hand touched the picture, then his own face.  
  
Neither of them sent anything.  
  
Then Kimi felt the subtle touch in his mind, taking things without asking, but also without opposition.  
  
Jaamies broke his silence. 'What is vodka?'  
  
Kimi didn't answer.  
  
He didn't care what anyone thought.  
  
But those green eyes looked at him. Proving the rule by being excluded from it.  
  
Jaamies moved closer. His face was inches away.  
  
'What is vodka?'  
  
Kimi swallowed. Slowly, he locked away the knowledge inside himself. Put it as far from his mind as he could. Until he wasn't even aware it existed. If he didn’t care what anyone thought, he shouldn’t be ashamed to tell Jaamies, who had no way out and never would, what Kimi did to forget how much Jaamies hurt.  
  
'Nothing important,’ he sent, quietly, as though Jaamies might not notice, and might forget.  
  
Jaamies hand touched his shoulder and he leaned into the comforting touch.  
  
He laid his face against Jaamies' shoulder when the Racing Driver wrapped his arms around him. He exhaled, and stopped fighting, then offered the memories, from his most recent drink to the first he'd ever taken. Every joke and story and ad about alcohol that he knew.  
  
It might have hurt if Jaamies had sat back and looked at him with judgement. He didn't, though. Kimi could have told him, Jaamies sent.  
  
'No, I would have already if I could have. You won't try to stop me?'  
  
Jaamies looked at him. He understood. He would never judge Kimi. He understood Kimi. Kimi was paradise. Kimi was home. If Kimi didn't forget that they were one Racing Driver in two bodies, they would be fine. Jaamies would never have any trouble remembering that he loved Kimi. Kimi needed to remember this when he saw what Johnny was going to take them into the stables to see, and if he could remember that he loved Jaamies, they would be fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	12. The Other Half

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- The Other Half**  
 **Redbull Race Training Compound (Redbull/Toro Rosso Stable)- 2009**  
  
The only real hang up was the breeding part of the job. Jaamies couldn't stand being in the room for it, and Kimi, with his connections shut down so he wasn't overwhelmed by the horror flooding him from his partner and the breeding pair, was no more help than any other handler. Much less help, in fact, because he shied away from being actively involved in the abuse.  
  
So he was firmly told to keep his ass out of the breeding rooms. Not out of the breeding wing, though, because he was very, very good with the Mares.  
  
They tended to spend their adult lives either pregnant or with babies on their hips. They were a taboo subject among the human matches on the racing teams, who tended to look away in discomfort when their Racing Driver's stud trips came up.  
  
They were significantly more damaged than the males in the stables. They were never physically abused like the males were, but nonetheless, inevitably physically less healthy, and very much mentally less healthy.  
  
Mares weren't encouraged to drive.  
  
Seeing the Mares' stable at Red Bull for the first time, Kimi had finally come to realize exactly how big the difference between Racing Drivers and humans was. There was no difference at all.  
  
The Racing Drivers on the teams led to the impression that Racing Drivers were racing machines with nothing on their minds but cars, and no care for anything but their drive and their match. But the Racing Drivers on the teams had been separated from their fellows, given nothing but driving to focus on, and pushed to the extremes of their potential. They seemed less developed than humans because they seemed less complex. That was not taking into account that if you took human children from their families at 4, kept them institutionalized, gave them one form of recreation and rewarded them ludicrously for success in it, humans, too, would grow up stunted emotionally and without a full range of skills necessary to survive.  
  
Tame Racing Drivers was a good description. They were becoming domesticated, and unable to survive on their own.  
  
The Mares were different. Kimi liked them immediately. Another Trainer couldn't have heard the constant flow of conversation the Mares and the little Racing Drivers kept up. Another Trainer would have just heard what their Racing Driver told them was being said. And the Mares were as tight fisted with their gestures as Kimi was tight lipped at interviews. There was no way to keep conversations with Kimi to nothing but gestures, though, not without the whole wing going mentally silent, and so he knew them better than anyone knew them.  
  
The Mares were kept in a more open space, and were allowed out of their rooms to interact. There was none of the driving-is-life competition here, which made the stallions so impossible to keep from each other's throats. Kimi was invited to stand in the best spot in the common area, and Jaamies, standing beside him, not nervously pressed against his shoulder for solidarity, was much fussed over. Kimi was knee deep in curious toddlers. They all wore jumpsuits in their various color affiliations, but none wore helmets. If there had been a handler in here, it would have been a different story, but Kimi was already bonded, and no amount of staring would create a bond with any of these Racing Drivers. The females were very curious about him and how he could talk to them.  
  
He couldn't explain it to them any more than he'd ever been able to understand it.  
  
They were very friendly, and happy he was there, but there was a guarded tone to their thoughts, beyond which he could still feel their undertone of sadness, and beneath that, he was sure, would be the deeper current of rage. One of them declared that Jaamies was too skinny, and they brought food out of their rooms.  
  
It wasn't so much that they cooked, with no method of heating being available. They took apart and remade the food they were given, though, into much more palatable arrangements.  
  
"Even here the women can't stop cooking," Kimi joked to Jaamies, eating a biscuit with some kind of celery and chili based spread. He was enjoying it and he didn't immediately notice when Jaamies froze beside him. When he did notice the silence from the other mind, he looked over. [What?]  
  
‘Mares,’ Jaamies sent.  
  
Kimi looked around at the females surrounding them; chatting, feeding and wiping dirty toddler faces, and enjoying the impromptu holiday. [What about them?]  
  
‘Mares. Not women,’ he sent.  
  
Kimi wiped his mouth with his fingers and licked them clean.  
  
[What difference? Adult females.]  
  
‘Adult female Racing Drivers are Mares, Adult female humans are women.’ Jaamies was looking at Kimi. He was usually only blank faced when there was something he wasn't sharing, but now he was expressionless.  
  
Kimi decided to stick with the point, rather than stopping to dig into this. He wanted another biscuit.  
  
[And yet, here we are.] He gestured to the dish of food.  
  
Jaamies stared for a moment longer, and then went back to eating. He sent a memory from Kimi's own mind of his mother setting plates of food down in front of him, smiling at him with love he could feel almost as truly as he could feel Jaamies' love. It was a quiet memory, on the edge of Kimi's awareness. Then he felt Jaamies struggling, and another memory, from much farther back, before Kimi had even been born, of a dish like one of these, and a love muted by foreboding, and a blond mother with a face tinged with regret.  
  
Kimi swallowed. He could see where Jaamies and Lentaa had gotten their looks. He put his arm around Jaamies. [Mothers are mothers.] He pressed his forehead to his Racing Driver's.  
  
[Do you want to find her?]  
  
Jaamies look at him in puzzlement. What for?  
  
[I don't know. You could tell her that her sons have 3 world championships between them.]  
  
Jaamies considered this. She did always seem very happy when he made good track times. She had taught him to flick the tail out in a corner. That was really coming in handy now that they were rallying. He said they, but Kimi wasn't really involved in the rallying. It was Jaamies who did the driving, and it was Jaamies who was the champion.

He would like to tell her about his record.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	13. Pedigree and Issue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Pedigree and Issue**  
 **McLaren Main Training Facility (McLaren Stables)- 2010**  
  
The lights clicked on as he entered the room, clicking off in the hallway behind him. The room was about 25 feet to a side, lined and rowed with filing cabinets to the 8 foot ceiling. There was a metal table and some chairs in one corner. The clock read 3:05. Kimi scrubbed his hand over the light stubble on his chin. He didn't consider himself actually up, yet, so he hadn't shaved before leaving his room. The room was cold. Outside it was summer, so he was wearing shorts and a light t-shirt. It was only about 60 degrees in here, and his skin raised in goosebumps.  
  
He fingered the edge of the ID and key card he'd used to get into this room. The grey lanyard dangling from it had the Mercedes and McLaren symbols printed on it at intervals. He looked at the labels on the edges of the rows. He walked halfway down the aisle that held the B files.  
  
He stopped with uncanny precision in front of the cabinet he was looking for. He opened the third drawer up, and flicked through the files. His fingers hesitated over the file marked 9552H1May1976. He pulled it out and set it aside. 8783C4Oct1968. He pulled that out as well. He glanced inside and then opened the next file drawer down. He removed file M6713P17Feb1948.  
  
He took the 3 to the table, setting the first file he'd pulled on the bottom of the pile. He opened the oldest file first. The name at the top was Glorious Lights. It was a much thicker file than the other two.  
  
DOB, gender, history, assessments. Kimi paged past these.  
  
Reaching out, he listened for Jaamies' mind. It was in the stillness of recalibrating. There was no sign of him waking.  
  
Kimi licked his lips and looked down at the file.  
  
He'd already found out they wouldn't be seeing her- Jaamies’ mother. Jaamies hadn't been upset by the news. He hadn't ever held out much hope. There was information Kimi was looking for, though.  
  
Glorious Lights born 1948 - deceased 1993  
  
First breeding 1963, Seppi(Jo Siffert). First litter, one filly, one colt.  
  
There were names and serial numbers, notes about successes. Or lack thereof.  
  
Second breeding 1966, Seppi(Jo Siffert). Miscarriage. Breeding pair incompatible.  
  
Third breeding 1968, Sisu(Piers Courage). Third Litter, one colt.  
  
8783C4Oct1968 Lentaa(Mika Hakkinen)  
Entries: 165  
Poles: 26  
Podiums: 51  
Wins: 20  
Points: 420  
World Driver's Championships: 2  
  
He skipped ahead until Fifth breeding, 1975, Sisu(Piers Courage)Artificial Insemination. Fifth litter, Two colts.  
  
9551G1May1976 Gimmie(NA)  
Deceased: 1989  
  
9552H1May1976 Jaamies(Kimi Raikkonen)  
Entries: 156  
Poles: 32  
Podiums: 62  
Wins: 18  
Points: 579  
World Driver's Championships: 1  
  
He looked at the rest of the notes, raising his eyebrows at the presence of Kuiva, Heikki Kovalainen's Racing Driver in the next breeding after Jaamies. Mercedes certainly seemed to breed for type. The last of Glorious Lights' colts had started racing in F1 this year. Kimi tried to remember a driver named Nico who might look like Jaamies and Lentaa. He had a different sire, so that might not mean much. Neither Kimi nor Mika looked much like Heikki. He would look more closely the next time he saw him, and keep an eye out for this rookie.  
  
There was only one more breeding after Nico's Hulk, and that was a filly, so there were no race records for her.  
  
He put Glorious Lights’ file to the side and opened Lentaa's file.  
  
The number of pages in his breeding record made Kimi blush. There were half a dozen before 1997, and since the there had been a...dramatic increase. Two or three Mares a year. Most of them with Artificial Insemination notes beside the names. In fact, since Lentaa started F1, there were only 2 Mares that didn't have AI beside their names.  
  
The foals were all too young for Kimi to recognize their names. The oldest two were just old enough to be matched. The others all had call names, something to differentiate them for the handlers, but not the names they would respond to when their matches chose names for them.  
  
In a rare moment of curiosity, he went back to the files and pulled another file. There was crossover breeding between bloodlines, so every stable had files on any Racing Driver who had bred into the line.  
  
Ferrari11164A06Nov169. The file was three times as thick as Lentaa's. The same way Lentaa's numbers went up after the Championship in 1998, Shoe's numbers went up exponentially each year after 1994. His first 4 colts were already matched and Kimi knew two of their names. Jaamies had been racing Prince and Nico Rosberg since 2006, and then...of course...  
  
He grinned when he ran his finger over Sunshine and Sebastian's names.  
  
There were a lot more coming.  
  
Between Lentaa and Shoe, there would be a lot of middle European boys being offered jobs in racing for the next 20 years.  
  
He set aside the file. He felt for Jaamies' mind again. Made sure there was no way he'd become aware of this. He touched the face of the last file almost hesitantly. After the spectacular disruption of their routine following the first attempt, Jaamies was considered by the other Trainers to be too high strung to try to coerce to stud. Kimi kept quiet about it and mostly 'forgot' to send specimen jars.  
  
He opened Jaamies’ file. It was much, much slimmer than the other two, of course. There were 4 records from before his Championship. One colt and 3 fillies.  
  
He checked Jaamies again.  
  
There were 5 colts and 4 fillies born since. Two mares currently pregnant. He felt cold, reading the names, nothing to do with the room temperature this time. Their names didn't mean anything, yet. Not until they were matched or started breeding.  
  
The oldest colt, almost 10, would be matched in 6 or 7 years, under this early matching system. He'd be driving within the decade. Jaamies’ sons would have good chances; they'd be given advantages and benefit of the doubt because their father was a champion. He would remember to look for the colts.  
  
He ran his finger down the fillies' names.  
  
Jaamies' daughters, though....it made him angry to think they were just...there for the next generation of F1 racers to feel too embarrassed to talk about. He kept them in his mind, though. Memorized the names and locked them away in his mind where Jaamies couldn't see them. He wondered how much effort it would take to sponsor women's racing teams. For the Fillies.  
  
He smiled to think of women's racing teams, full of Jaamies' daughters, and then frowned when he realized these were the emotions that new F1 teams sprang from, men perpetuating the harm for the twisted belief that it was better than offering their partners nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	14. Young

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Max Verstappen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Young**  
**Redbull Race Training Compound (Redbull/Toro Rosso Stable)- 2010**  
  
Kimi and Jaamies were visiting the Redbull stable. He had finished his residency and was now part way through what might be called his fellowship. Since he was specializing, he had extra training to go through. He'd arrived this morning to observe an experienced Matching specialist, Johnny, the first time he'd worked with his own supervising Trainer in months. He was coming down a hallway with Jaamies trailing him, when they came upon a group of boys.  
  
There were 6 or 7 young teenagers. The oldest looked like he was about 17. They were loafing in the hallway, chattering like jaybirds and half gesturing to one another, the young ones a little uncertainly. They were being loud and taking up most of the hallway, unconcerned that grown-ups might want to walk down the hall without squeezing to the side.  
  
He knew exactly why they were here. They were the matches for Red Bull's new generation of Racing Drivers. Some of the older ones were obviously more conversant with gestures and adopted the classic Racing Driver stance when they stood. The older 3 would have been matched a year or more before, probably working in Formula Renault or GP3.  
  
The others were probably here for the first time. They'd probably had explained what was going to happen, and then bonded their Racing Drivers within the last few weeks. They would be starting on Formula Renault teams next year. They would have to be able to handle the pressure of their jobs.  
  
The older ones crossed their arms and stood back as they realized someone was coming towards them. This drew the attention of the other boys, who also stepped out of the way. One, standing on the fringe of this group, looked more like he was 12 than 16, he didn't move, but he was far enough to the side that it wasn't a hindrance.  
  
They were a few steps past the boys when one of them actually deigned to look at the adult who was so rudely walking along the hallway, minding his own business.  
  
"Oh my god!" the teenager wailed, "that's Kimi Raikkonen!"  
  
Kimi indulged in a moment of shutting his eyes. Then he turned on his heel and marched back to the boys. They looked from him to Jaamies and jaws dropped.  
  
"You young men, you are racing drivers, yes? What is it, then, screaming about seeing other racing drivers? You will see lots of racing drivers, you scream and act like fanboys every time, that will be embarrassing."  
  
The boys got wide eyed and silent. Except the little one, who stared at Jaamies like he was trying to stare him down. Jaamies quirked an eyebrow at the boy.  
  
"You are professionals, now, you should act like professionals." Kimi turned to the little defiant one. "Stare all you like, you only get one." He put a hand on Jaamies' shoulder and guided him away.  
  
Giancarlo was the premier specialist in matching. He worked with newly matched pairs at a variety of different stables all over the world. He was also a doctor. There were no doctorates for Racing Driver medicine, but he had a PhD in medicine, and a couple decades worth of studying under the best Racing Driver medics and a practice covering a huge variety of Racing Drivers.  
  
He talked to Kimi in depth about how the matching process worked. The facial recognition software that accessed public records, and some not so public records. He skipped over the techniques used to persuade the boys; Kimi was familiar with them, anyway.  
  
He talked about how the matches coped with the life changes, how the Racing Drivers coped with being matched. How sometimes the boys who'd had to have more forceful persuasions had difficulty adapting afterwards, and had to be monitored closely. He didn't elaborate, but Kimi saw the lingering eye contact when the medic said this to him.  
  
Then he went on. It was largely this that the early matching had been intended to deter. In the 90's, the matches had been picked from among 18 and 19 year olds, who had been groomed long beforehand. They debuted in their early 20's. Younger matches were generally more open to the prospects of being famous, rich and popular, without having the perspective to realize that most people did just fine without. It was hoped they would be more likely to be satisfied with their lifestyle when the thought occurred, if they were inured to it.  
  
An ugly feeling crawled across Kimi's mind when Johnny said this, remembering that Seb had been trained, young, in this very facility.  
  
Trained not to question whether this was the best thing for him.  
  
There were two schools of thought on the earlier matching. The first was that the earlier a Racing Driver started driving the longer their careers would be and the more money they could make for the companies.  
  
The second was that a random selection of teenage boys will contain boys who are not mature enough to cope with the incredibly difficult job of handling a Racing Driver. The problem was, the boys at 14 and 15 just wanted to play games on the simulators and whine about when they would get their cell phones back.  
  
These points of view were not even taking account the other set of random teenagers, the completely naive Racing Drivers actually being entrusted with million-euro cars.  
  
It was a cataclysm.  
  
Too many of the young Racing Drivers were being mishandled and having their potential hindered. Johnny told him that in the next few years, the super-license requirements would go up to 18. By then, who knew how many Racing Drivers would have no career left because their handler had drunk himself off his feet and drowned in a swimming pool or wrecked his car, or mishandled his Driver so badly the Driver couldn't race.  
  
‘Because this is what happens when the companies raise the children,’ Kimi thought, ‘they grow up stunted and with unrealistic beliefs and priorities.’  
  
Johnny led him back through the corridor. The older boys were gone and only two of the younger boys were left- they stood out of the way immediately. One had a huge, dopey grin on his face, but the other, who'd recognized Kimi initially, was glaring. If he didn't get that out of his system quickly, his Driver wasn't going to be having much of a career. As they walked past, the boy whispered loudly, "Did you see how his Racing Driver hangs all over him? Faggots. No, bestiality."  
  
Kimi stiffened. It wasn't the obvious attempt to arouse his anger. Racing Drivers needed contact with their matches, and some more than others. If that kid was rejecting touches from his Racing Driver, because of some insane misplaced homophobia, his Racing Driver was going to sense that disgust and rejection, and start internalizing that hatred. Kimi looked at Johnny. He had stopped and talked to the boys before, because no one else had been around to see their inappropriate behavior. But now, the head Trainer was here, and this wasn't time to presume.  
  
Johnny's face had gone red. He kept walking but called back over his shoulder, "Free time is over, boys. Get back to wherever you're supposed to be. Becket, we're going to have an extra session immediately after you're done today."  
  
He turned down a side corridor, and Kimi wasn't really paying attention. He was too busy trying not to explain to Jaamies what bestiality was and why that boy had said it about them.  
They passed through a security door and into the hallway where the stallions’ suites were. It was a very nice facility. There were serial numbers and names on neat plaques on each of the doors. One of them was slightly ajar.  
  
Johnny rolled his eyes. They walked to the door. Two boys, one about 15 and the littlest one from the hallway, were sitting on the floor, pressed knee to knee, gesturing emphatically at each other. They looked up, and it was like looking at the same boy at two different ages. There was a flash of fear in their eyes, and the younger boy snatched up his Racing Driver's hand. They relaxed when they saw it was Johnny, but when the boy saw Kimi and Jaamies, his eyes widened and his hand tightened on his Racing Driver's.  
  
The Racing Driver saw Jaamies and stood up, practically dragging his younger self with him. He revved the beginning of a challenge.  
  
"Alpha males," Kimi muttered. Jaamies stepped around the two men into the room. He walked right up to the boy and looked down at him. The teenager hadn't gotten his full growth yet. He stared up at Jaamies.  
  
"Don't fight, Pilot," the little one said, trying to pull his partner away.  
  
Jaamies pulled Pilot into a hug and held him, murmuring a soft idle and resisting the younger Driver's attempts to pull away.  
  
Kimi caught the gist of what reassurance he was sending, but it was quiet and meant for the teenager only. His lips perked a little at the corners.  
  
The teen relaxed into the hold after only a moment. He started sending frustrated memories about how the other stallions thought they were better than he was, and how they said his match was too little for him to ever get to race, and how he was really the best Racing Driver in the stable, and why didn't they treat him with more respect? He sent a sense of his own prowess.  
  
It was, more or less a Racing Driver's own assessment of his skill level, and while it was generally objectively true, a Racing Driver who had spent his life in the training stable could have no idea how his record of wins stacked up. Kimi sent the teen a taste of one of the rookie Racing Drivers Jaamies had raced rally with. He hadn't been particularly talented, but he was only a year or so past his probationary period, maybe a year older than those boys in the hallway. Closer to his level, but with real world experience.  
  
Pilot started; he hadn't realized Kimi could hear him. He stood back from Jaamies, pulling his match close to his side. He sent back that he could drive better than that, if he could drive something better than the karts on the tracks here.  
  
Kimi sent amusement.  
  
Jaamies sent a feeling of what it felt like to have one of the multiple world champions breathing down your neck.  
  
Pilot went a little pale, but raised his chin. He could do better. He tried to go looking in Jaamies' head for memories he could compare to himself, and Jaamies slammed his mental walls down.  
  
He patted the teen on the shoulder. It was impressive seeing a stabled Racing Driver that wasn't cowed by the experience of what Jaamies had just shown him. He might be overestimating his skill, or he might have that much potential. Even good drivers could get bad drives. It remained to be seen. Jaamies turned to Kimi and put his hand flat.  
  
Johnny was watching. His eyebrows were raised. He nodded when Jaamies gestured, and said to the boy, "Shut the door on your way out, Verstappen." Then he turned and continued down the hallway. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> To find out what happens to Max Verstappen, Daniil Kvyat, Carlos Sainz, and Daniel Ricciardo during the winter of 2016-2017, please read "Redbull Boys' Roadtrip."  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/8593972


	15. Feeding Your Racing Driver Sandwiches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Sebastian Vettel, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Feeding Your Racing Driver Sandwiches**  
 **Kimi Raikkonen's House, Baar, Switzerland- 2012**  
  
Seb sat down next to Kimi, pressed against him all along one side as if there was no other room on the couch. He smiled at Kimi and looked at the TV. Racing Drivers, driven by emotion and immediacy, were extremely physical with one another. The public weren't really aware of this tendency, since the Drivers couldn't be on camera with their matches and didn't like touching other humans. They would touch their matches only. Jaamies had told Kimi that Racing Drivers and their matches should, ideally, be one Racing Driver in two bodies.  
He could see that in some more than others. Mika looked just like his Racing Driver, but Sebastian's heart was the most like his Racing Driver's. When Kimi had mentioned that Seb might come over, in that vague way one did without ever really expecting anything to happen, Seb had jumped on the idea and made actual arrangements. That was nice, because when Kimi had said it, he had meant it. He didn't even mind Seb mimicking his Sunshine's habit of roughhousing and patting and leaning on his fellows. If the Racing Drivers were physical beings, Sunshine was exponentially more so.  
  
Seb stopped talking when the hall door opened and a stocky blonde walked through, completely ignoring both of them and opening the refrigerator door to lean in and stare at the food. He pulled out a meal Kimi had left there for him, then walked back through and sat down on the chair by Kimi's side of the couch and looked under the bread of the sandwich.  
  
"What are you inspecting it for? I didn't put hot sauce on it." Kimi reached out and stole a little handful of crisps off the plate.  
  
Seb gaped at the two matching blondes in the living room. "Is...Is that your Racing Driver?"  
  
"Yeah, this is Jaamies. Jaamies, say hello to Sebastian."  
  
Jaamies looked up at Sebastian, jutted his chin, and made a quiet engine noise. He pointed at his plate, then at the crisps in Kimi's hand, then at Sebastian.  
  
Kimi did as he was told, offered Sebastian one of Jaamies' stolen crisps.  
  
"Why isn't he at the stable?" Sebastian ignored the attempt to share.  
  
"He likes it better here. I have the license to have three Racing Drivers. He is the only one here right now."  
  
"Lotus lets you do that?" Sebastian couldn't take his eyes off the free-range Racing Driver.  
  
"FIA lets me. I had to get the class 1 license when I took him out of F1 to rally. While I was out, I qualified for the class 2." Kimi looked back at the television. As if that was his focus.  
  
"What? What license? You had Jaamies living with you the whole time you were gone?"  
  
"My Trainer's license. You have to have one, and a FIA approved facility, to stable Racing Drivers. Trainers have to have problem cases out of the stables sometimes, and they have to be close enough to their own Driver like you only get when they're always around."  
  
Sebastian looked at Jaamies and his sandwich. "So, there is somewhere for him to go, when you retire from F1 for good? He isn't just going to the stables?"  
  
"Yeah, we will keep working. Ferrari wants me to start training their colts when I start back there next year."  
  
It had been rumored, but the casual announcement that Kimi was returning to Ferrari was lost in Seb's obvious shock at the rest of the wash of announcements.  
  
"Does a Racing Driver have to be a problem case to live outside of the stables?"  
  
"No, Jaamies isn't."  
  
"Could you bring Sunny here?"  
  
"Yes. You could learn Training and keep him yourself, too. I will keep him here if you like, until then, if your team medic will agree."  
  
Sebastian squeezed Kimi's leg. "Let's go get him!"  
  
Jaamies pulled his plate away instinctively in alarm when Seb jumped to his feet. He looked up at the boy with his mouth open, and then looked at Kimi.  
  
Kimi fended off the non-verbal complaint about sudden lunges, and at the same time put a restraining hand on Seb's arm. "There is a lot of paperwork, to get custody of a Racing Driver transferred. It takes like three months to even get them to send it to you."  
  
Sebastian's face fell. He'd clearly been hoping they could just drive to the stable and Kimi would flash his Trainer's license and they would bring Sunny back immediately, maybe in time for dinner.  
  
"Fortunate for you, I had them send extra copies the last time I applied to have a Racing Driver stay here." Kimi smirked at the expression of incredulity on Sebastian's face. "You fill it out and turn it in to Red Bull. We'll talk to your medic first, so he knows what he should say. It still won't be fast. 4 months maybe. It has been 2 and Mancha still is not here."  
  
Jaamies rumbled, the audible equivalent of an eye-roll.  
  
Sebastian looked over Kimi's shoulder at the Racing Driver. "Whose Racing Driver is Mancha?"  
  
"He is Felipe's Driver."  
  
"Why are you keeping Felipe's Racing Driver? You aren't teammates with him anymore. Or is he staying at Ferrari, instead of Fernando?"  
  
Kimi sighed. "I am learning to be a Trainer. Trainers stable the Racing Drivers they are working closely with. Just because I would take Sunny who has no problem, other Drivers here will sometimes be problems."  
  
That was when it really started to register with Seb, that Kimi wasn't just carrying a license to bring his Racing Driver home and feed him sandwiches. He was really learning to rehab Racing Drivers.  
  
"If Sunshine is here, you will have to come here and work with him." Kimi told Seb. "You will have to have progress to show, or they will send him back to the stables. It will be your paperwork, you asking to have more intense training than just what the teams usually offer."  
  
Sebastian grinned widely. "Will you teach me what being a Trainer includes?"  
  
Kimi nodded. Beside him, Jaamies looked down and shook his head. Kimi returned the thought. 'I know, Jaamies. He's not going to like what he finds out.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	16. What Trainers Do

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, (Sebastian Vettel, Felipe Massa), Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- What Trainers Do**   
**Kimi Raikkonen's House, Baar, Switzerland- 2012**

Sunshine was not, it turned out, free of problems. The first day he arrived at Kimi's place, part way through the next season, he stared Jaamies down, stepping forward as Jaamies stepped back, until Jaamies was backed into the corner of the back hallway. He tried the same tactic on Mancha, but Mancha never even looked at him, just singing to himself and ignoring everything around him. So Sunshine stood flush up against him, face to face, forehead to forehead and growled. When Mancha didn't respond, Sunshine pressed his teeth gently on the other Racing Driver's cheek and slowly bit down, increasing the pressure until the other Racing Driver did respond. By shrieking and pushing Sunshine away and dashing out of the room.  
  
"Damn." Kimi stepped forward and gestured at Sunshine, who fixed him with the sweetest grin and came right away. He was a little taller than his match, and when he stepped into Kimi's space he was looking down at him. Kimi didn't make eye contact back, just pointed at the door where he'd sent Jaamies to follow and help Mancha, and sent to Sunshine that he was not to be so overbearing with the other two. They had both backed down; it wasn't acceptable to harass them.  
  
Sunshine's upper lip curled in an angry frown, he sent back a picture of his teammate. Rabbit wouldn't stay cowed for more than a second at a time. He had to keep on him to keep him in place. He could never ever let up, never ever, ever take a break, or Rabbit would be there again, challenging him.  
  
It ran across Kimi's mind that Rabbit could probably use some one-on-one time with a Trainer.  
  
Jealousy was flooding across his connection with Sunshine. Sebastian had really admired Mark Webber, before he and Sunshine had ever met. Sebastian shouldn't admire ANY other Racing Driver. Sebastian should only care that Sunny did well. Rabbit should give in, because Sunny was the better driver and the world champion, and the one Sebastian loved best, and Sunny would take down any Driver who thought otherwise.  
  
Kimi was about to say something, when a flash of memory followed up Sunny's rant. A memory of satisfaction when Sunny had stared Shoe down and Shoe had put his hands up and backed away, every time they met. Until once, when he pushed it too far, and like a lion who'd grown tired of the cub's wrestling, Shoe brought to bear the power of 7 world championships and pinned Sunny in place, and in another room, Sebastian had gasped in pain, brought to tears by the overwhelming insignificance of their few wins.  
  
Kimi could understand the feeling. Jaamies, in typical young Racing Driver fashion, had swaggered up to Shoe and told him he was doing well, for an Old Man. Whereupon Michael had appeared with a pair of keys to two identical cars from the car park, and Shoe had thrashed Jaamies so soundly around the track, there had never been any further question. Now, Jaamies was a match for just about any Racing Driver on the field, his training giving him the advantage over even Drivers with more wins. He could have stared Sunshine down but, like Shoe, he saw there was no point. The younger Driver needed the sense of dominance; Jaamies was confident within himself.  
  
[These two aren't going to endlessly challenge you. You don't grind them into the ground.]  
  
Sunshine stared down at him. He tried to catch his gaze.  
  
Kimi shook his head and turned away. [My place, my rules, Sunny.]  
  
Sunshine strode after him and tried to step around in front of him. Kimi turned his back on him again and pressed his hands on either side of the door frame. Sunshine growled in frustration.  
  
[Do you like the stables so much?] Kimi gestured, not turning his head from the doorway in front of him.  
  
Hate for the stables rolled into Kimi's mind. His chest clenched with the raw power of it, and his eyes stung with tears.  
  
He sent pictures of Sebastian sitting in the living room, in the kitchen, laughing, free from the constraints of the Paddock.  
  
Sunshine tilted his head and stepped back a little, looking around him. He reached into Kimi's mind, looking for more memories.  
  
Kimi blocked him from taking anything he hadn't been invited to, braced for the step that was coming next.

The first time this had happened he was taking hiccuping breaths by the time he felt the Racing Driver drain from his mind. He'd dug his fingernails through the skin of his palms; he had only become aware of the stinging as the all-consuming sensation ended.

This time was like having the ceiling fall on him. Sunshine hit his mind so hard that Kimi flinched. He had to keep himself from remembering. If Sunny stole memories, Kimi would remember them, but they would be white hot with pain, as though he'd been in a world of agony when he'd been experiencing them. He focused on not thinking about what Sunshine wanted to know. On remembering anything else. On his senses and what was here and now. But his barriers were being pried out of the way fairly easily.

Jaamies flowed into Kimi's mind, filling him so much he had to exhale to make room, filling him so much that Sunshine couldn't find a way in. Jaamies himself stepped into the room, pale and blonde in a white t-shirt, his haircut not exactly matching Kimi's, and all he had to do was stand in the doorway and look at Sunshine to make the feeling of being pried open stop. Jaamies didn't even have to push Sunshine away. Kimi went with the feeling of being in two places at once and turned. He and his Racing Driver stood pressed side by side, watching the younger Racing Driver.  
  
[If you want to go back to the stables, I will send you back to the stables. I will tell Sebastian you didn't want...] He sent memories of himself and Jaamies about the house, away from crew and lies about how much they shared. He superimposed imagined pictures of Sebastian and Sunshine over them. He felt the desperate want come back from Sunshine. [And I will tell him you wanted to fight more than you want to be…] A picture of Sunshine and Seb racing on the kart track outside. [Or you can stay here and see what we do.]  
  
What did Kimi and Jaamies do?  
  
[Come see.]  
  
Sunshine followed half a dozen paces behind. Kimi and Jaamies, still shoulder to shoulder, walked up the steps into Mancha's room. Jaamies had left him sitting on his bed, listening to his headphones. He looked up when they came in, eyes lingering on Sunshine, but not reacting otherwise.  
  
Kimi had almost immediately fallen into his specialty as a Trainer. He didn't like the medical aspect, and while Jaamies was a good driver, he wasn't a natural teacher. But the calming effect the two had on the Racing Drivers dropped them neatly into therapist mode with almost no thought or effort.  
  
Kimi smiled and gestured for Mancha to take his headphones off.  
  
Jaamies moved and sat beside him with an arm around him.  
  
Mancha made a sad face at Jaamies, but didn't move away.  
  
Kimi pitched his sending so that Sunshine could hear them as well. He sat on the corner of Mancha's bed, about a foot away from him. He used the remote on the bedside table to turn on the TV and started a video. It was a Grand Prix video from 2002. Large parts of it were onboard footage from Mancha's car. Kimi watched the video and gestured his approval of how Mancha had driven. He smiled every time the video showed good technique on the Racing Driver's part, and told him how well he'd done. He asked Mancha what he'd been thinking, how the corners had felt, and listened as his match should have.  
  
Jaamies kept one arm around him, patting him in approval, supporting and rewarding him as his match should have.  
  
Little by little, Mancha opened up, telling Kimi more about how good the drive had been, what the car had been doing, what she had told him about how she was feeling. Kimi quickly redirected him away from any mention of what hadn't gone quite right, how things hadn't been quite up to snuff, or what Felipe thought he should have done instead. He kept the tone positive. He praised and sent warm feelings to Mancha about his performance. Gave him all the appreciation his match should have.  
  
They'd gone over this race 3 times, so far, but Mancha was getting more and more open and confident each time. They had started at the beginning of his F1 career and gone race by race until Mancha didn't feel terrible about how he had performed in each, wasn't totally focused about how he was in Felipe's way.  
  
Kimi had separately been spending time talking to Felipe, which was going more slowly, because Felipe just saw him as some other driver who was getting in the way of his relationship with his match. He was making progress, too, though. He was realizing that Mancha wasn't to blame for the way things were going. Kimi was talking him around to realize that Mancha was an ally, not an enemy. Once he got to the point that he would be willing to talk to Mancha again, Kimi would bring Felipe and Mancha to the track and give them a while to talk. Not too long- just long enough to realize they'd missed one another but not long enough to fall back into old patterns.  
  
He explained all of this in asides to Sunshine. Sunshine tilted his head at the thought that Mancha's match was struggling with their bond. He didn't like thinking that matches would do that. If one match could resent their Racing Driver, could Seb resent Sunshine? That would be...so sad...  
  
Sunshine crawled over the bed and wrapped his arms around Mancha and put his head on the littler Racing Driver's shoulder and squeezed him, and sent surety that his match would be nicer to him the next time they saw one another. Sunshine told him about all the paperwork Sebastian had done to get Sunshine here and how Felipe must have done all that boring writing in boxes, too, to get Mancha taken out of the stables and brought to this other, better place. That meant Felipe loved Mancha and wanted things to be better between them.  
  
Kimi was surprised by the application of abstract information and the conclusion Sunshine had reached. He was not surprised by the way Sunshine had reacted to his own conclusion. Sunshine was the second friendliest Racing Driver in the Paddock, right after Sugarboy. He cuddled against Mancha, pressing his forehead to the other Racing Driver's temple, this time in a completely non-threatening way. He put an arm around Jaamies, too.  
  
Jaamies leaned back out of Sunshine's view and looked across the other two Racing Drivers' backs to look at Kimi. His pale green eyes, picking up white reflections from his t-shirt, flicked to the fluffy blonde, then back to Kimi. He sent a feeling of an accidental seeming J-turn, one that was executed so cleanly that the driver was facing exactly where they needed to be.  
  
Kimi nodded, just the barest motion of his head. Yeah, Sunshine was no fool, no fool at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	17. Penance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Penance**  
 **Buddh International Circuit, Greater Noida, India- 2013**   
  
FIA wasn't making being back in F1 easy. He spent a year in NASCAR after the year in rally while FIA reminded him how little control he had if he did not have FIA's favour. How easily they could take F1 with no promise of return. Just as easily as they took hockey from him, and just as easily as they'd taken his freedom.   
  
Lotus was his trial to make sure he was dedicated to the cause. To make sure he'd learned his lesson and come back more humble and willing to bend to their whims, and to not show up randomly in the middle of the night at the track and nearly interrupt their mafia tactics and murder of Kimi's friends. To get back into the bosom position, he would be humble, he would bend. He would keep himself and Jaamies in the eye of the storm, the one place they might be safe. Michael and Shoe would have stayed safe, if they hadn't tried to break away from where FIA put them.   
  
So Kimi and Jaamies waited at Lotus, and Jaamies did his best with a car that didn't deserve him.   
  
Kimi was in the pit, facing the monitor, but seeing the track in front of Jaamies. The Racing Driver ached from the effort of pushing the car to give something that might make a difference in the race. He was following his line, it was his and he had a right to be on it.   
  
Goose was behind him in the other Lotus. The Racing Drivers had shut down their connections to anyone but their matches. That was pretty typical during a race, because talking to one another was a distraction. He knew Goose was there, but the line was his.   
  
The radio clicked on, and in the moment of silence between the click of the machine engaging and the actual transmission of sound, Kimi bumped back into his own body.   
  
He heard it through his com, and in the garage and through Jaamies' ears.   
  
"Kimi! Get out of the fucking way!"   
  
The radio was loud as it was and Jaamies squealed in pain in Kimi's head at how much louder it was when Permane screamed into it. As if stupid directions mid-corner and the constant, constant nagging weren't bad enough.   
  
Kimi thumbed his own radio; didn't this asshole know how sensitive Racing Drivers were? "Don't shout there, fucker!" he bellowed back, realizing too late that he was shouting into Jaamies' earpiece as well. There was another squeal of protest at the further shouting into the headset while Kimi defended Jaamies' driving. He sent profuse apologies to his partner, but the anger at the team was spilling over into Jaamies' race. Jaamies' impatience with the humans' inability to get things together was spilling over into their bond. The frustration was spilling over into everything.   
  
Lotus was a penance. It was a penance and it couldn't go on much longer. It was a trial he had to continue to endure. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	18. Alondra

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, Kimi Raikkonen, Mark Webber, (Sebastian Vettel, Fernando Alonso), Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Alondra**  
 **Kimi Raikkonen's House, Baar, Switzerland- 2013**  
  
The sports car purred as Kimi drove up the street. He was not as good as Jaamies, but he liked driving, and the machine was undeniably a fine piece of engineering. He felt his hands tightening on the wheel as he drew progressively closer to the house, though. His thoughts, which had been drifting along peacefully most of the way home, were starting to focus on the tension he would be faced with when he got back. He would probably be able to feel it for the mile or so before he even got there.  
  
The Ferrari he was driving was a perk of being allowed to return to the team. Another perk, and he had to be honest, it was a perk, was the part of his contract specifying that he would stable his teammate's Racing Driver, even before they actually started on the team.  
  
It was nice to have another Driver in residence, since Mancha and Felipe had repaired their relationship and Mancha had returned to the Ferrari stable the year before. 2013 was turning out to be a good year for them, and Kimi had enjoyed having retired stallions staying with him on breaks from the stables. He had even hosted Je, one of the Racing Drivers he had always been very close to. It had been interesting to have Jean coming by from time to time. Professor and Alain Prost had been less amusing, but educational.  
  
Kimi had hoped a permanent third Driver would give Jaamies and Sunshine more socialization. The two got bored easily and drove him crazy with their constant games. Alondra was easy to get along with. He was hard to compare to most of the Drivers, and everyday was an education. An education of a different sort.  
  
The tension wasn't Alondra's fault.  
  
Racing Drivers understood their hierarchy, and that eliminated Paddock politics among them, which was one of the best things about being able to talk to them. The men got into squabbles and ego trips and petty grievances, bullshit Kimi had no time for. Drivers settled it on the track and that was it until the next race.  
  
The Racing Drivers didn't base their relative worth on superficial human ideas like crossing the finish line first. Driving a terrible car well was worth more than driving a good car poorly; any of them could win in a car if the rest were in karts. They all understood this implicitly. It was about the driving, not the winning, that was never in question. They were just thrilled to be driving. They didn't have to get chest to chest and growl, once they were free of the mind numbing frustration of the stables- except in one case.  
  
The Ferrari tapped the apex of the winding corner, not neatly, but in a kind of offhand way that rubbed off on matches after years. Kimi's phone buzzed. He answered it with the handsfree feature.  
  
"Kimi." Mark Webber's voice came on the line and Kimi allowed himself a genuine frown. "Hey, just reminding you I'll have Rabbit until late tonight. Try to be awake when I get there, huh?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Vettel's coming over tomorrow for his Driver, right?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Is he being nicer to Alondra?"  
  
Kimi scrunched his nose. 'I am having my very own team radio moment.' He didn't answer; Mark would get tired of the silence and start filling it up.  
  
"Well, he'd better be. Rabbit's been having enough trouble with the car. I don't need him being all worried about Jaamies and Sunshine ganging up on Alondra. He's finally getting over the bad lap times, so you'd better be keeping away that vicious little..." He stopped himself. "Fernando's been all on my case about Alondra's times, too."  
  
Kimi shifted down and braked for a stop sign.  
  
It might be worse letting Mark talk.  
  
It had certainly been worse having Alondra than he'd anticipated.  
  
When he'd taken Sunshine, the constant mental caterwauling that he and Rabbit had initiated at the Redbull stable had ended and the Racing Drivers could have a break from the battle. But every race weekend and every practice and every winter testing, they were back at it. The Trainers had managed to stop the worst of the effects, but the two. Never. Let. Up.  
  
Kimi let Mark's talk wash over him, accelerated up to cruising speed. It had been easy for Mark, he hadn't been living with Sunshine's conviction that Alondra was in some way untrustworthy and subversive, ready at any moment to betray them to Rabbit. Conversely, at the track Rabbit was jealous and distrustful. Alondra had spent the first two weeks of his stay with Kimi only communicating with Kimi, because every time Jaamies tried to talk to him outside Training sessions, Sunshine stepped between them and herded his best friend away from Rabbit's best friend.  
  
It was worse than leaving Alondra at the stables.  
  
Mark must have realized he was not getting the result he wanted from Kimi, because he trailed off. "Just keep in mind what I said. I'm still not convinced this is a good idea. They're just the same on race weekends. Anyway, I've got to get back. Simulator session's ending." He hung up, knowing by now not to wait for Kimi to bother with the pleasantries for him.  
  
Kimi shook his head; he tapped the gate remote, timed the opening of the front gate perfectly, and drove up into the garage. Race weekends might be just the same, but that was because Redbull's team, trainer, and the two matches kept treating the two just as they always had. A quick threat to revoke the privilege of attending the next Grand Prix had worked just fine for Kimi. Sunshine and Rabbit had stopped growling and stepped away from the chest to chest challenge position. Red Bull would probably not approve of this tactic, and he probably couldn't actually enforce it without some sort of injunction, but that was the beauty of the Racing Driver's inability to understand paperwork.  
  
The decision on how to deal with the suffering performances of all 3 Drivers he was stabling and Rabbit's as well had been entirely in Kimi's purview, but he hadn't been sure how to handle it. He'd come to realize that Sebastian was, for some reason, more fearful than was usual that Sunny would be sent back to the stable. Kimi didn't want Alondra to leave- the contract had severe restrictions on whether Kimi could send him back to the stables, and whether he could get him back once he did. And Jaamies obviously wasn't leaving, nor would that help.  
  
The problem wasn't Alondra, and it wasn't Jaamies, neither of which could leave, anyway. The problem wasn't just Sunshine, either. It was Sunshine and Rabbit.  
  
So Kimi upgraded his Training License.  
  
Then he applied to stable Rabbit.  
  
Sebastian yelled at him. Kimi knew Sebastian, though, and just told him. "I have a plan. Don't worry."  
  
Then Mark yelled at him, but that was easier, because he really didn't care what Mark thought.  
  
Red Bull played the two Racing Drivers against one another. If he could keep either from getting anyone else on their side, the naturally social creatures would either kill one another, or hopefully drop the aggression.  
  
Kimi was a little curious to see which.  
He squeezed the steering wheel, braced himself to face what was waiting for him, got out of the Ferrari and went inside.  
It had been a long day. Kimi walked into the living room. Rabbit was gone for the day for Mark's scheduled practice, and Jaamies and Sunshine were sitting next to each other on the couch, golden and pale like the sun and the moon, making up for the time when Rabbit would come back and Sunshine would only be allowed to talk to Rabbit. It was slow progress, but each regarded the other as a better option than nothing, when the other two refused to talk to them until they managed to be civil.  
  
And whenever either Rabbit or Sunshine went for practice, the other would be able to talk to both Alondra and Jaamies. It wasn't a great solution, but a truce had been reached. It was all undone after a weekend back with their team, unfortunately, but it was getting easier to recover from every time.  
  
Kimi flopped down into his chair, remembering halfway down that he should have checked. Unable to abort the fall, he braced himself. Then swore loudly and jumped back up.  
  
Jaamies and Sunshine were staring at him placidly from the couch. Jaamies wondered why he kept doing that when he knew by now to look. Sunshine wondered if Kimi was just doing it to be funny. His face broke into a wide, warm grin.  
  
Kimi picked up the 10 inches of broken off green tree branch, the thickness of a pencil, with twigs and leaves at one end, now rather crushed from his sitting on them. He stared at it, and then turned to the two Racing Drivers.  
  
[Why does this keep happening?!]  
  
Sunshine was really cracking up, now, his engine thrum of a laugh vibrating through the living room. Jaamies shrugged.  
  
[Yesterday there was a handful of dirt on my pillow, and last week there were rocks on all the chairs in the dining room.]  
  
Sunshine was doubled up, slapping his knee.  
  
Jaamies wondered why Kimi didn't look when he was sitting down.  
  
[Sunny, is this some sort of joke you are playing?]  
  
Sunshine just thought it was hilarious that Kimi was so worked up about it; he had nothing to do with it being there.  
  
It hadn't been there when Rabbit left this morning.  
  
[Where is Alondra?]  
  
Jaamies gestured to the south. There was a wall in that direction, but that was no impediment to his knowing where the other was.  
  
Kimi walked into the kitchen. No Alondra. Then he looked through the front window.  
  
"What the fuck is he doing?"  
  
Alondra was sitting next to the driveway, sorting through the gravel. He must have sat down only moments after Kimi had pulled into the garage, because he would have noticed him there otherwise.  
  
As much as Kimi ever stormed, he stormed out of the house and up to Alondra. It was more like a light snow flurry. Before he could demand to know what the Racing Driver was doing, Alondra turned and looked up at him. He had a grin on his face. He was just delighted with himself. He held a handful of gravel up and offered it to Kimi. Then he looked down at the gravel along the side of the driveway, and sent a feeling of happiness that he'd found such a great spot.  
  
Kimi looked at the gravel in his hand. He looked over to where Jaamies and Sunshine were watching from the open doorway. He had that missing a card from the deck feeling, again. What should he have known that he didn't? This was obviously something Alondra found rewarding. Why? There was nothing inherently special about the gravel, or the stick, or the handful of dirt. Did Fernando collect rocks or something?  
  
He didn't want to ask Alondra what he was doing, because that would imply that Kimi didn't like it or that it was unusual or maybe bad. So, like he would with a child, he indicated his pleasure. He couldn't let him stay out here, though. The house was private, but not totally isolated, and someone was bound to notice Fernando Alonso sitting in his driveway picking apart the macadam. Then there would be paparazzi and pictures and he would have to explain why Alondra was out here gathering roadway for him.  
  
Roadway...  
  
That didn't work, because he obviously wasn't confusing the driveway for a track.  
  
[Let's go inside and find a great spot to put these.] He gestured, practically picking Alondra up bodily. He could hear a car coming.  
  
He hurried Alondra and the others inside and closed the door before the car passed.  
  
Now, how did he go about finding out why Alondra kept bringing the outside inside?  
  
[Where should we put this?] Kimi asked, Sunshine and Jaamies were uninterested in what Alondra was doing, but were getting great amusement out of watching Kimi's discomfort.  
  
Alondra brushed his hands off on his pants and looked at Kimi, his grins slipping a little. Didn't Kimi like the diamonds?  
  
Kimi actually took a second glance at the pebbles. Had that been what he was missing? No. They weren't diamonds. They were just bits of regular rock.  
  
'Got that bitch some diamonds, bitches love diamonds,' Alondra sent.  
  
For the horrible heartbeat before Kimi recognized the meme, heard in Fernando's voice, his world spun out of control.  
  
'Humans like to have things,' Alondra sent. Things in his sending were clothes and furniture and bric-a-brac. When Fernando was really happy with someone (in the memories these were women) he got them shrubbery and rocks. (Flowers and jewelry.) Alondra was very glad Kimi was letting him live here, and those great rocks were exactly the right size.  
  
Kimi opened his mouth to say something and stopped. He thought for a moment. Then he sent gratitude that Alondra wanted to thank him for letting him stay. Kimi sent that he was glad Alondra was here. He started to tell Alondra that he didn't need him to give him presents, and then thought about it. It wasn't really presents, like one would give to women one was dating, Alondra was giving something he considered valuable. It was repayment.  
  
Kimi wasn't going to tell anyone they couldn't pay their own way. He didn't want to keep washing soil out of his pillowcase, though.  
  
And he didn't want Alondra out in the yard pulling branches off the trees either.  
  
He gestured for Alondra to follow him. [You can help me by learning something new.] Jaamies and Sunshine followed about 10 feet behind. Kimi walked through a door into a large, echoing space and flipped on the light. The Racing Drivers didn't usually come in the garage, because they got too worked up about not being allowed to drive. He turned and faced Jaamies and Sunshine. [This isn't a driving thing. Don't worry, go back inside.]  
  
Sunshine made a whining noise, and Jaamies just cocked his head as Kimi shut the door with them on the other side.  
  
The garage fit 4 cars, but the far space was taken up by the trailer with the two snowmobiles under the tarp. His Ferrari and his pickup were in the first two spots. The third was taken up by an old Fiat Abarth. The floor was clean and the work bench was neat and all the tools were put away.  
  
Alondra went straight to the driver's side door of the Ferrari and shimmied excitedly.  
  
Kimi shook his head walked right past, to the Fiat. Alondra looked devastated when Kimi opened the door, then curious when he leaned in and popped the hood. "You'll like this." He lifted the hood. They looked at the engine. A lot of young Racing Drivers were embarrassed by their first view of an engine, as though they were looking at something indecent, something personal.  
  
Working in an F1 garage broke them of that almost immediately.  
  
Alondra watched Kimi, who pointed out all the parts. He'd have seen engine work but would never have been allowed to take part in it. His eyes went wide as Kimi's explanations of parts came together into a cohesive explanation of the whole.  
  
Kimi grabbed two pairs of coveralls out of the cupboard. He put one on and had Alondra do the same. Fernando wouldn't be happy if Alondra got his clothes greasy. He always had him dressed fashionably. Kimi tied the top half of his around his waist like a jumpsuit, leaving his white t-shirt uncovered.  
  
Then they changed the head gaskets. It took about 4 times as long as it would have taken for Kimi by himself. At 1 AM Kimi felt Rabbit in the driveway. The doorbell rang and Jaamies told Kimi he was letting Mark and Rabbit in. Mark swept into the garage and stopped dead. He stared at the two of them, covered in grease, Kimi standing with his hips against the frame a gasket in one hand, a wrench in the other, and Alondra hopped up on the frame, leaning down into the engine compartment, his feet 4 inches off the garage floor.

They stared at him. Behind him, Jaamies rolled his eyes, and closed the door.  
  
"Ha?" Kimi said.  
  
"Oh my god, Kimi, he's covered in schmutz. Fernando is going to kill you. He's got it in his beard." Mark walked over and looked down into the mess in the engine compartment. He did a double take. "Have you ever done this before?"  
  
"It is little more complicated teaching someone who's never held a wrench."  
  
Alondra scratched his beard with a greasy hand. He was grinning widely. He put down the wrench and gestured that he was a mechanic, now, and he was going to build his own car. He imitated the coughing sputter of a dying engine and shook his head. Not a bad car, a good car.  
  
"And who must talk with his hands. He nearly put my ear out with a screwdriver." Kimi indicated a deep scratch up the right side of his face.  
  
The door opened and Rabbit leaned around it. He tilted his head, asking if he could come in.  
  
It was 1am and it had been too long a day to try and enforce the rules in unusual grey areas. So he waved Rabbit in.  
  
Rabbit visibly thought through the choice to stand beside Mark or Alondra. He'd just spent the whole day with Mark, though, and hadn't been allowed to talk to anyone but Sunny for the last two days, so he stood next to the greasy racing driver and looked at the mess of parts and tools.  
  
Mark watched him making small questioning gestures to the other Racing Driver. Then he looked at Kimi.  
  
"Your Racing Driver answered the door. He just stood there and looked at me. I thought he was you."  
  
"He has a different haircut," Kimi pointed out.  
  
"Still, aren't you worried about someone finding out about him? What if it hadn't been me?"  
  
"I knew it was you, I sent him to answer the door."  
  
"How could you have known it was me?"  
  
"Who else would it have been?"  
  
"Lost pizza delivery boy, neighbor, broken down car on the road, paparazzi, Vettel."  
  
"Then he would close the door."  
  
Mark looked like he was trying to find a way to make his point without saying it directly.  
  
Kimi watched him think.  
  
Then he gave up and went back to installing the new gasket.  
  
Rabbit looked up and gestured to Mark that Alondra thought he was going to build his own car. He made a confused amusement gesture. How could a Racing Driver build his own car? What would the engineers do? And it would be too difficult with all the humans in the way milling around the garage with nothing to do.  
  
The assumption that Alondra would be building his car in the team garage (even without all the team still in it) intrigued Kimi. It was a natural assumption for Rabbit to make. Where else would a Racing Driver imagine a car being built?  
  
Mark shook his head.  
  
There was a little knock at the garage door and Jaamies and Sunny poked their heads in. Why was everyone in the garage without them? Kimi sighed and waved them in. They came over and crowded around the engine compartment. Sunny and Rabbit were keeping a careful distance between them.  
  
All 4 looked at Kimi.  
  
He raised his eyebrows.  
  
"If you can follow the rules, you can talk," he said and gestured.  
  
Alondra started gesturing about how he'd taken apart the rocker arm.  
  
The others were very impressed, and wanted to know what a rocker arm was.  
  
Mark was watching with a strained look on his face.  
  
Sunny made a joke.  
  
Rabbit laughed at it.  
  
Mark turned to Kimi with wide eyes. He jerked his head to the side and stepped away from the group of Racing Drivers, as though being out of hearing range meant they couldn't follow the conversation, even though Mark gestured as naturally as he spoke.  
  
"When we came in, Rabbit nodded to Sunny. Just nodded. Now he's..." He waved his hand at them.  
  
Kimi waited again for him to get to the point.  
  
"How are you doing it?"  
  
Kimi shrugged. "I'm not."  
  
"The Red Bull Trainer has been trying to get them to back off the whole time."  
  
"The Red Bull Trainer makes them compete."  
  
Mark's turn to stare.  
  
"They're Racing Drivers. Competing is what they do."  
  
"It is not a competition if no one can ever win."  
  
"He wins, and then never lets Rabbit forget it."  
  
Kimi looked over at Rabbit. He was withdrawn, even from Alondra. Some Drivers weren't as affectionate, but with Rabbit, it was accentuated.  
  
"They are competing for different things."  
  
"Like what?"  
  
"I don't know."  
  
"Really? Why not? You can read his mind, right?"  
  
The completely straight faced assertion came out of the blue. Not visibly reacting was an absolute giveaway if you didn't visibly react when any sane human should have, so Kimi put on his slightly wide eyed face.  
  
"What are you talking about?"  
  
"Rabbit told me."  
  
That was even more surprising. None of the Racing Drivers had EVER told their matches that he could talk; it would jeopardize the entire Paddock, and all the Racing Drivers in all the stables.  
  
Mark looked at him, still serious. He lowered his voice. "I would die before I would tell. I would die before I would put him at risk."  
  
Kimi's jaw worked. It wasn't Rabbit that would be at risk. And Mark would be lucky if he was allowed to die. If the company found out, he would be made to tell. Then it would be Kimi and Jaamies. Maybe Mark hadn't made the connection between Schumacher and what happened. Maybe he really didn't know this was a death sentence.  
  
"Did anyone approach you, the time you were on Top Gear?" Mark asked.  
  
Kimi stepped away, jaw tight. "Don't you bring that shit here."  
  
"There's a group of us, racers and..."  
  
"Stop!" Kimi stepped away again. "I've heard all about that, I want no part of it."  
  
The Racing Drivers had all looked up, now.  
  
Jaamies made a questioning rumble.  
  
The tension between Sunshine and Rabbit immediately ramped back up to its usual levels. They stepped away from each other, growling.  
  
Everything telescoped. Kimi tried to stuff his anger down. He had to get on top of this situation.  
  
Mark stepped forward towards Sunshine and Rabbit. Kimi didn't have to feel Mark's mind to sense his anger.  
  
The growls rose.  
  
Things might have gone very, very badly.  
  
Instead Alondra hopped off the car. He walked between Sunshine and Rabbit, as though neither of them were growling. He stopped, still partway between them, but mostly as though he'd just walked to where Kimi could see him. He gestured that he did not know what to do next, and needed Kimi to come tell him.  
  
It broke the tension.  
  
There was fear pouring off of Jaamies, and confusion off of Sunshine and Rabbit. Alondra looked into Kimi's eyes, and sent him trust and confidence. He glanced behind him at Jaamies, and then back at Kimi. Kimi was cold and speed, and an underlying sensation of safety. He waited for Kimi.  
  
For Kimi to keep them all safe.  
  
As if Kimi wasn’t trapped more deeply than any of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> To find out more about WHY Sunshine and Rabbit can't get along, please read "FIA."  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/9287987


	19. The Night Terrors Never Stop

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- The Night Terrors Never Stop**   
**Kimi Räikkönen House, Helsinki, Finland- 2016**

There wasn't any moonlight tonight. The only light in the room came from down the hallway. Kimi was sitting up in his bed, with his knees tucked up and his head resting on them. The comforter felt cool and nice on his hot face. He had his hands grasped around his knees. At this point it wasn't even an effort to breathe himself calm; he didn't have to think about it.

A teenage Racing Driver slumped back against the wall of his stall, watching him with half lidded eyes and barely glancing at the keys he held up.

The bed shifted. A soft, cool hand rested on the back of his neck and then stroked down his bare back. "Have some water, baby."

"Stop being such a baby! You cry all the fucking time!" the boy snarled, getting in the Driver's space and glaring down at him.

[You're making me hurt!] the slightly smaller, thinner Green gestured back.

He raised his head, unclenched his hand from around the other wrist and reached for the tumbler of filtered water. He drank part of it and set it on the bedside table. "Thank you."

The Green waved his hand out of the kart for a handhold.

The boy stood back with his hands in his pockets.

When the Green finally caught the edge of the frame and pulled himself out of the crashed kart, he tilted his helmet at his match and revved a question.

"If you can crash yourself, you'd better be able to get your loser ass out by yourself."

The hand stopped stroking down his back and combed through his hair, fingernails scratching his scalp just perceptibly. "Beckett again?"

The boy squared his shoulders when Kimi spoke to him. "Don't tell me how you think I should treat my Driver, I'm trying to train him to race, not seduce him. I'm not turned on by animals."

Behind him, the little Driver shut down his connections. He put his chin on his chest. Silent tears rolled down his cheeks.

"Yeah," Kimi said, tightly. He flexed his fists.

He let himself be collected up into a hug.

Kimi had left Jaamies at the flat today. He shifted from foot to foot outside the little dorm room. He knocked, took a breath to refresh his calm. Beckett had been so eager to match, and then so resistant to giving in to sharing with his Racing Driver.

"Yeah," a voice came from inside the room.

He had said horrendous things, and it made Kimi sick. Even so, now that things had changed, Kimi was prepared to share the emotions of this experience with him. He walked into Beckett's room.

The boy was sitting in the dorm's single chair, with his feet propped up on two cardboard boxes in the middle of the room, typing into his phone. "What? You here to tell me I have to go visit him? Bring him flowers?"

Kimi scratched the back of his neck. "No, I am not." He took a step forward, holding a hand out, palm up. The boy glared at it. "Blitz didn't wake up, Ryan."

Beckett went pale. "Well, come back and get me when he does," he said hollowly.

Kimi shook his head.

Beckett set the phone down on the bedside table. He looked out the window. "Shit," he whispered.

Kimi looked down. He had liked Blitz a lot. He'd been incredibly brave in the face of a match who couldn't accept that their connection was a two way street. Beckett's life was never going to be easy after this. Matches whose Racing Drivers died didn't usually have good lives afterwards. How could you, living with only half of what you were, what you could have been?

"Fuck, I was sure this was my ride. How could he go and get himself sick? Too weak to fight a little bug. What a waste of time."

Kimi's head came up. He could feel the icy seawater brushing at his skin again, for the first time in a long time.

"When can I get someone to come and pick me up? I wasted an entire season here. I'm going to have to work my ass off to make up for this shitfest. I'm already packed." Beckett waved his hand vaguely at the boxes. He looked at Kimi. "What are you so torn up about? He was never going to fuck you."

"Blitz was a good Racing Driver, and he cared about you. He would have done anything for you." Kimi found himself speaking from under the cold of the sea. "He deserves you to be sorry about what happened."

"I'm not sorry. I'm a good driver, too, and I'll do better without a pussy like him dragging me down all the time. Now I'll get to drive without having to worry. I didn't have time to coddle him like you do."

Kimi wasn't a man who was inclined to violence, but he wanted to hit Beckett a lot. Instead he decided to give HIM a taste of the cold. He laughed roughly, let himself be the heartless son-of-a-bitch some people thought he was. "You think there's a drive for you? After this?" He let out a bark of laughter. "You killed one of FIA's most promising Colts. He was lined up for Redbull. Your career was paved. But you couldn't get over yourself long enough to treat him with the decency a man shows to a dog. He was expensive, Ryan, you'd have been paying off his training and keeping for the rest of his career. If you think FIA is going to let you ride their valuable livestock into the ground like that and have a career afterwards, oh no. Men who let their Racing Driver die get blackballed. You will never race again, not anywhere. Not even on kart tracks. You are going to spend the rest of your life paying for what little of his price you will be able to cover, and your family after you. You have a little brother, right? If they can't find him a Driver, then he'll spend his life working on a crew, on a track, as a janitor, they'll find something."

He hated himself for saying these things, using them as a weapon, but maybe if someone had hurt Beckett in return earlier, then sweet, strong little Blitz wouldn't have died whimpering, unable to stand against on the black hole of hatred his other self had put up between them, so desperate for love that all the love Kimi and Jaamies and all the other Trainers at Redbull had been able to pour into him hadn't filled the void. If someone had hurt him like he hurt blitz, maybe it would have made a difference. Maybe it wouldn't. Anyone who could do that to someone who never gave up trying to get his love across, not until his last moment - pain wouldn't stop them. Something was wrong inside the boy, and even being rewired for the most loving relationship a human could experience hadn't been able to fix it.

"You think I coddle mine?" Kimi smiled, every inch the Iceman. "Yeah. And I didn't smash my career with my own hands, all because I was able to refrain from murdering him with selfishness. Too bad you are not so smart."

He considered, nodded at the completion of his task and turned on his heel and walked out of the room.

"What is worse? Using what I knew against him, or regretting that I did it?" He asked, voice muffled by a soft shoulder.

"You should talk to a Red and see about letting it go, oh Kimi, it's been so long. I know you feel like you could have stopped it, but people like that are not changeable. Someone should have checked to see if he was a sociopath before they let him have that Driver." Kisses were pressed to his temple, long years of habit proving it was a good way to soothe him. "Don't blame yourself, baby."

Then again, maybe not such a proven way of soothing him. He still had to be shaken out of the nightmares, didn't he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	20. The Future

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Sebastian Vettel, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- The Future**   
**Kimi Räikkönen House, Helsinki, Finland- 2016**

For fall, it was a cold day. Clouds had rolled in off the sea and there was a steady wind. The Racing Drivers were inside, and Kimi was outside, lounging on a lawn chair, legs splayed out in front of him, head back, holding a beer. As a concession to the 20 degree drop in temperature the previous night, he was wearing sneakers with his shorts and tank top.

The door slid open and then shut, quietly. "Hello, Sebastian."

The golden haired boy huffed. "How do you always know it is me?"

Sebastian couldn't see Kimi's face from behind, with the brim of the cap in the way, and Kimi indulged in a smirk. 'Because I can't hear your mind,' he thought.

Sebastian sat in the lawn chair next to his and took a drink from a beer. "I was even quiet, just like Jaamies."

Kimi rolled his head to the side and looked at him when he said this. 'Now that's a funny way to put that. Why Jaamies and not Sunny? Why wouldn't I know where Jaamies is?' "You make more noise than your Ferrari," he quipped. "Which I heard pull up. I'm not deaf, you know."

"I saw the paperwork on the table when I came through. Are you stabling a new Driver?"

"No, I'm doing a consult. One of the Drivers I helped match is having some problem. His handler doesn't want him to race."

Sebastian raised an eyebrow. "Why would he not want him to race? He's a Racing Driver, that's what they like to do, to race. What would he like him to do? Be a fry chef?"

Kimi took a drink of his beer. "The handler knew Bianchi."

Sebastian's mouth made an O shape.

"And his father was driving at Imola in '94." Kimi took another drink. "This kid wanted to play the cello. I have not heard him, but his father says he was very good. He does not play anymore. Now he does not want his Racing Driver to race, to die. His father worries about...what will happen if he does not race. His father's Racing Driver was the first one other than Jaamies that I ever really got close to."

Kimi finished the rest of the beer and put the empty bottle on the pile.

Sebastian took a slow pull from his own bottle. "It is hard to feel you owe someone, when the price is something you don't want to pay."

"I need another drink." Kimi started to push himself up.

Sebastian pushed his beer into Kimi's hand. "I will get it for you."

Kimi flopped back into the chair. He took a deep pull of the beer. He sat and stared at the tree across the yard. He tried to think about the colour of the bark, and the shape of the leaves. He tried not to think about Jules Bianchi. He tried not to think about the hockey contract. He tried not to think about cello music, and a father's fear of company retaliation, and the first time a Racing Driver had put an arm around him because it loved him almost as much as its own match, and the terror he felt whenever Jaamies crashed.

He thought about little Gee, and how scared he'd been when Kimi and Jaamies had talked to him about what was going to happen- what he needed to do, and how much he would need to love the human boy who was going to come in and take off his helmet. F1 legacy aside, it was very rare for two generations of matches and two generations of Drivers to be matched together. But Gee was Je's son and Guiliano was Jean's son, and it was Kimi's fault.

He had taken the freedom from Gee. He had taken the cello from Guiliano.

He was the man who had taken away their future.

Just like his had been taken away.

A pair of arms wrapped around his shoulders, and he looked up into dark blue eyes and golden hair, the most genuine smile and warmth like a summer's day.

[Hello Sunshine.]

Jaamies threw himself onto the lawn by Kimi's chair and gestured to Sunny to watch what he had learned. He rolled over backwards, tucked his head in and hoisted his feet up over his head, then pushed with his arms, landing on his feet. Sunny dashed over to ask him how he'd learned to do that.

"That was impressive," Sebastian said, handing Kimi another beer and sitting down again. [Don't break your neck so you can't race, Sunny.]

Kimi watched the Racing Drivers playing. Golden and Pale, the sun and the moon. And he wondered what was so bad about this future that he'd bought and paid for. Maybe the regrets were just habit.

The Racing Drivers both stopped moving, suddenly, heads whipping around to stare south, towards the house. Kimi and Sebastian exchanged glances and looked, but they didn't see anything.

Kimi stretched out and felt. There was a Racing Driver in that direction, coming towards them, fast. He was projecting calm and happiness, but with a grim determination.

Kimi could hear engines now, like diesel trucks.

Jaamies and Sunshine started making knocking sounds. The kind an engine made right before it ripped itself apart. The sound sent chills down Kimi's spine. The two Drivers grabbed their matches' arms and pulled them to their feet, dragging the protesting men step by step towards the far end of the yard.

Jaamies grabbed both of their arms and barked a command at Sunny, who released his hold on Sebastian and ran to the fence at the edge of the property and along it, to the gate.

The feel of the Racing Driver didn't change, other than continuing its rapid approach.

Jaamies' grip on their arms tightened painfully and he pulled harder.

There was a screeching of brakes, and a slam of truck doors from the other side of the house.

Sunny was fumbling with the latch on the gate.

Sebastian kept turning to look behind him at the house, and Jaamies kept snarling at him every time he did.

Sunny had the gate open and was waving at them to hurry.

The back door of the house and the side gate burst open and men in Kevlar body armor and helmets carrying assault rifles streamed out, shouting in English and Finnish and German.

Jaamies barked another command at Sunny. Sunny immediately disappeared through the open gate like a rabbit through a hedge.

Jaamies was still trying to pull Sebastian and Kimi to the gate when the men approaching across the lawn raised their guns.

Kimi could feel Sunshine running through the brush on the other side of the back fence, getting steadily farther away. Mind blank but for determination.

"Put your hands up!!"

Kimi transferred the command to Jaamies, who dropped his grip and the three raised their hands.

"Nobody move! Don't say a word!"

The men had stopped streaming out of the house, now. There were 10 or 12 of them, some scanning the surroundings, some with their weapons trained on the two men and the Racing Driver. "Vettel went out the back. Blue team, go get him," the leader yelled. 3 men peeled off the group and charged through the back gate.

'Vettel went out the back?' Kimi thought. His eyes flicked to Sebastian.

"The house is clear, Sir," one of them called.

"Roger that. Bring Tank in here."

Kimi sent Sunny an urge to run faster.

The leader pointed at them. "You don't say a word, and you don't make a move until I tell you to, you understand me? We're here to get them out of here, and you're not going to be signaling to them, or interfering with us, understand?" He was speaking Finnish.

A man in body armor came through the side gate with a Racing Driver at his side. The Racing Driver, Tank, was radiating calm and love with a desperate fervor. It was extremely unsettling. Like a stranger hugging you in a bar and declaring their love. Which was a thing that had happened to Kimi pretty often since he'd started appearing on television. He reached out to the Racing Driver, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Now," said the leader. "Move away from them."

Kimi felt Sunny, now at the edge of his range, but afraid. The men were catching up to him. He was starting to come up with a desperate plan.

None of the those in the yard moved away from the others. If anything, they huddled more closely.

"Separate them." Two men stepped forward and tried to pull Sebastian and Kimi away from Jaamies.

Kimi jerked his arm free. "No!" He pulled Jaamies close and wrapped his arms around him, tucking him into his chest, expecting any moment to feel bullets.

"Kimi!" Sebastian cried out.

The leader's eyes flicked across them. He tapped his headset. "Blue team, runner is the Driver, repeat, runner is the Driver. Vettel is here. Do you copy?"

"Copy that."

Kimi became aware, now that he had Jaamies against him, that the knocking noise had never really stopped, it had just gone sub vocal. He could feel it vibrating through his partner.

"We are taking these Drivers into protective custody. Vettel, you're coming with us."

"You cannot take them." Kimi clutched Jaamies to him and spoke into his hair, but firmly and loudly, trying to get on top of the situation. "They are my responsibility. FIA has no right to take Racing Drivers from a Trainer's protection without due course."

"FIA has no right to treat these people like animals!" The soldier snarled at Kimi.

Sebastian started moaning. "Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god." He'd stopped looking at the team leader and was staring toward the back fence where Sunny had gone. The Racing Driver had gone out of touch with Kimi, but evidently not out of Sebastian's range. "Don't fight them, Sunny!!" His face twisted into fierce concentration. Then went slack for a second.

Then he was back. He was screaming. "Oh my god!!! Oh god!!" He turned and threw himself into Kimi. "This is your fault!!! You fucker!! This is your fault! He would have been safe at Ferrari! This would never have happened at the stables!" He hit Kimi over and over. Kimi was rolling with the punches, trying to keep his hands over his face, but Sebastian kept finding openings. Jaamies was trying to push Sebastian off, and then the armored men were pulling the three of them apart.

They stood, chests heaving and staring at each other. Kimi felt each bruise blossoming like absolution. He had absorbed the expression of Sebastian's terror and rage, it would keep him from turning on the soldiers, for now.

The leader's radio clicked on. "Driver is down, repeat, Driver is down. We're bringing him back."

The truth of having it said out loud hit both men like a long fall into the frozen sea; a stinging slap, and then crushing pressure and muscle cramping cold. It couldn't be true, but his heart hurt so much with the fear of it. Kimi put his hands over his mouth and wailed in sorrow. Sebastian was curled double, face red and coughing from screaming so hard.

Jaamies was stroking Sebastian's back and hair, crooning to him, comforting him like a good Trainer should.

Years of practice and years of training kicked back in. Kimi settled his face into a cool expression, spat the bile taste from his mouth, and dropped in front of Sebastian, who was still bent over, hands on knees, alternately gasping and wailing. He ignored the guns pressing against his ribs and took Seb's face in his hands.

"Shhh, shh, take a breath," he said softly. "Just concentrate on taking a breath. A normal breath." He looked up at Jaamies, who took his eyes off the guns and went back to stroking Seb's back.

Seb frowned deeply at Kimi, and then took a shuddering breath.

"That's good. Let it out. Slowly."

There was a definite moan quality to the exhalation, but Sebastian did as he was told. "Kimi, oh my god, Kimi, I can't lose Sunny." He took another much-too-big breath.

"One breath, Sebastian, just one breath at a time. Breathing is what we're going to think about. Take 5 of them and we'll talk about what to do."

They took 5 breaths, each more normal than the last.

"I was scared if he was at the stables something would happen to him when I wasn't there."

"I know you were. But we won't dwell on the past. We will think about what to do, now."

"What you're going to do now, is come with us." The leader pushed between them. "FIA will be busy defending the big stables, but this place is going to have attention real quick, you can bet on it. We're putting all of you in the damn truck and we'll sort the rest out, later."

Kimi's tenuous calm snapped again. "Why?! What is going on?"

"The Grand Tour," Sebastian whispered. "The Grand Tour starts today."

Kimi shook with rage. "What grand tour?!"

"Jeremy Clarkson-"

Kimi groaned.

"His new show started today." Sebastian held up his phone. There was a file transfer happening. "They are exposing the Racing Drivers. What the companies do to them. All live online."

"We've got to get you out, before FIA sends men in to put you all down. Get in the truck." They were practically dragged to the trucks. Kimi was pushed into the back of one and Jaamies and Sebastian pushed into the other, with a prone Sunshine.

"He hasn't been shot," Kimi heard a soldier report, outside the van, "He's just collapsed. His heart is beating, so he didn't burst it. Can't tell what happened. Tank says sometimes, in the stables they just...burn themselves out." He said it in that tone matches used when they couldn't quite translate what their Driver had told them. That must be Tank's match. "I can't tell if he's going to make it. He didn't wake up when we carried him back here."

The doors closed and Kimi and 8 soldiers sat in silence.

Kimi pressed a hand to a wet patch on his face and looked at what came off. It turned out to be saliva. Sebastian had been practically frothing at the mouth.

"Good thing your buddy hits like a girl," one of the soldiers said.

Kimi nodded, still staring at his hand. "Yes, it is."

After all, if Sebastian had really beaten him to a pulp, how would he have helped him recover from the shock of "losing" his Racing Driver and convince the team not to leave him behind? He had reacted more viciously than Kimi had expected, but against a level of despair unreachable by an unmatched human, Kimi could have imagined men doing worse.

Sunny, who was pretending to be unconscious in the van with Seb and Jaamies sent him amusement. Hadn't he been such a clever Racing Driver to think it up? How nice of Tank to warn them that the men planned to take them all away from Kimi.

Kimi kept a perfectly straight face, and sent back a wave of delight that Sunshine was such a clever, clever trickster.

Clarkson had already proven his inability to protect the drivers that supported his cause. Kimi couldn't let Seb and Sunny and Jaamies get taken to wherever Clarkson was sending them alone. While he was protecting them, he could also turn his attention to the dissolution of the Racing Driver industry

So everyone could have a future again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	21. Refugee

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Sebastian Vettel, Mindy Hammond, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Refugee**  
**Airfield Outside Murmansk, Russia- 2016**  
  
Kimi had gotten out of the habit of sleeping every free moment, but the van ride, with soldiers who were mostly unwilling to look at him, let alone speak, had lulled him off to sleep. He woke when he felt the vehicle slow and turn. Immediately he checked in with Jaamies and Sunshine in the other van. Sunshine told him a joke one of the soldiers had told Seb, and Jaamies informed him that they’d been driving all night.

He also sent that Seb had gotten over his fright for Sunny and wasn’t angry with Kimi anymore. It had hurt to deceive him with Sunny's fake collapse, but Kimi had seen him try to act. Sunshine's plan wouldn't have worked if it had relied on Sebastian's acting.  
  
There was darkness outside the windows, but Kimi felt a pang of terror at what he could feel outside, now that he was fully conscious again. He nearly jumped off the bench seat.  
  
The distinct buzz of hundreds of Racing Drivers was coming to him from the direction they were heading. The soldiers had lied; they were taking them directly to a stable. Something didn’t make sense, though. From Jaamies’ description, they’d been travelling for 10 hours. There wasn’t a stable within a 10 hour drive.  
  
He sent a query to Jaamies, who sent him some convoluted impression of some glorious open meadow full of Drivers, all unhelmeted and skipping about. Over the image was another impression of Jeremy Clarkson opening cage doors and freeing everyone into the meadow.  
  
Information disseminated from one match, through their Driver, through another Driver, and passed on to Kimi was sometimes very clear, sometimes painfully clear. Some matches transferred clearer information than others. Usually the information transferred this way from Sebastian was not clear. It was usually muddied with emotion spikes and tacked on associations.  
  
When he picked through it, the conclusion he arrived at was they were being taken to wherever the other people like them were being taken. They’d obviously brought a lot of Racing Drivers here, as well, at least a couple stables' worth. It was more of them than he’d ever felt in one place before.  
  
The vans stopped. Poor illumination was coming through the windows in the cab, but nothing was visible from where he sat. The soldier in the passenger seat got out and came around to the back to let them out. One of the soldiers gave Kimi a push, as though he was a recalcitrant prisoner. He jumped onto the tarmac of an immense airfield. There were huge hangers in a line and runways stretching into the darkness. In the lightening around the edge of the horizon he could see they were in a broad, flat valley.  
  
There were 2 women and a man standing between the vans and the hangers, watching the soldiers help Sebastian, Sunny and Jaamies out of the other van. The man looked over and noticed him.  
  
"What is HE doing here?"  
  
Kimi rocked back on his heels, just perceptibly.  
  
The leader of the soldiers started to speak, "We were running out of time and we couldn’t get him away from the others. Vettel’s driver had some sort of episode."  
  
"While they were chasing him through the woods!" Sebastian yelled. "Kimi was helping me!" Sunshine and Jaamies snarled, nodding their heads. They began gesturing, and Sebastian turned to gesture back at them.  
  
"We don’t have the resources to keep someone watching him the whole time to make sure he doesn’t tip off FIA to our location," the man snapped at the lead soldier. "You had a gun, didn’t you? Now we’ll have to deal with him here. Take him behind a building or something and get rid of him."  
  
The Drivers snarled again.  
  
A roar rose and echoed through the hangers, like some prodigious beast waking in the night. Like the sound of hundreds and hundreds of engines. It shook the buildings. It was so loud Kimi could feel it on his skin. In his mind all the voices made his headache.  
  
The people from the hangers crowded together, eyes filled with fear, staring back towards the thunderous sound. The soldiers raised their guns nervously. The handler with the Racing Driver was trying to calm his wildly gesturing partner.  
  
Sebastian was yelling about how Kimi would never endanger any of them.  
  
There was a spike of pain in the group of Drivers in one of the stables, and then an expanding ring of fear, like a palpable smell, and more spikes of pain. The panic spread inside far too many Racing Drivers in far too open spaces. Kimi took a breath and pushed the overlapping feelings away. There was a human scream that cut through the lower pitched engine sounds. Then another.  
  
Jaamies was in front of Kimi, reaching out mentally and physically. Kimi closed his eyes to focus. Together they pushed his calm into hundreds of minds. It was the calm he had learned to force himself to -paid such a high price to learn- but now it came easily him to spread it out to all those who needed it. He kept his breathing smooth, felt the heartbeats he touched slow until they matched his own. The sound died down in a slow wave.  
  
Kimi opened his eyes and looked into Jaamies’ eyes. There was a blissed out smile on his match’s face that he knew was mirrored on his own. Jaamies flicked his eyebrows upwards in the [you see?] gesture.  
  
He squeezed his Racing Driver’s hands and spoke into the silence, "When you kill me, you have no one here who can stop them, the next time." He looked at Sebastian. "They could, maybe. If he would." He sent a message through Sunny. That they had to try to stop the rioting if Kimi did die. That they would have to find the strength within themselves to stop it.  
  
He looked at the man who’d said all this. "I remember you from McLaren. You resent me so much?" The man had been one of the engineers when Kimi had driven for the team. They had never gotten along, but Kimi hadn’t thought the man wanted him dead.  
  
"We’re not the ones who make the call about who was brought. Anyone like you, who openly supports FIA, has no right to be here."  
  
His eyebrows drew in. He supported FIA?  
  
He hated FIA.  
  
There hadn't ever been an option to show that, though, and of course they couldn't know that Ferrari's star Trainer, who worked his way back into the heart of the organization, no matter what they put him through wasn't doing it because he was a sycophant. He was doing it because Top Gear, or the Grand Tour or whatever, wasn't going to protect him, if FIA found out what he could do. FIA thinking he was their man would protect him and Jaamies.  
  
He'd done the job well, obviously. Too well.  
  
At least someone saw through it. Or had been told.  
  
"He’s here now," one of the women said in a British accent. The other woman nodded. "He’s going to have to earn his keep, just like everyone else. You won’t be sending up flares to attract FIA’s attention, will you?" she asked with a hint of sarcasm.  
  
"I don’t want them finding this place."  
  
"That’s good enough for me. Let’s get them settled." She waved them towards the hangers.  
  
Sebastian flashed Kimi a grin, then he and Sunny went and walked beside the woman, speaking quietly but urgently. Kimi and Jaamies followed. This had been a terrible day. He felt like he was in shock. Jaamies reached out and felt Kimi’s pulse. He shrugged. Everything would be alright. They were together, and no one would want to put them down once they saw what good Trainers they were. Obviously there weren’t enough Trainers here to take care of all these Racing Drivers.  
  
They were led into the nearest hanger. It was mostly full of cots, with weary, confused people milling around. Only about half as many as there were cots. The engineer from McLaren flashed Kimi an unhappy look, and headed away from the group. The woman who hadn’t said anything followed him, speaking sharply to him. The British woman led them along one wall, which had a scaffolding fixed to it, supporting a series of curtained off areas. "This is our Racing Driver sleeping accommodations." She waved at the makeshift cupboards. "We have cots for you two, over here. There are some other matched teams coming. So far we’ve only got about a dozen matched Racing Drivers, here." She was quiet for a moment. "None who can do what you just did, Mr. Raikkonen. He said you were his hero, but he never said you could do anything like that." She smiled secretively and ran a finger over her wedding band.  
  
"Who said that?" Kimi asked.  
  
She turned and smiled. "My husband's Racing Driver."  
  
She led them beyond the cupboards, to the far end of the hanger and pointed out two cots. "These will be yours. I realize you didn’t have a lot of time to pack." She looked at them. Realized they weren’t carrying anything. "The strike team didn’t give you time to grab a bag?"  
  
The two looked at each other. "No…" Sebastian said, "I was at Kimi’s house. They just burst into the back yard and threatened us with guns and pushed us into the back of trucks. They chased Sunshine through the woods."  
  
The woman looked pissed. "We’ll get you some supplies. You make yourself comfortable, Mr. Raikkonen. Sebastian, come to the radio room with me, and we’ll look into your concern. You can leave your Racing Driver here."  
  
Sunny sat down on the cot and bounced a little, with a disappointed smile.  
  
Jaamies pulled Kimi to a seat between himself and Sunshine and they both put their arms around his shoulders. It felt safe and warm between them. He was pretty sure Sebastian was wrong about this being like skipping through a meadow.  
  
A few minutes later, Sunny turned and looked where Sebastian had gone, his jaw clenched and his eyes tight.  
  
Seb was speed walking back towards them.  
  
He had a scared, angry face on. He stood in front of the three and held his hand out for Sunshine. Sunny took his hand and stood with him. "I’ve got to get out of here. No, don’t get up." Kimi stopped halfway to his feet, and sat back down.  
  
Sebastian wanted to leave him here?  
  
Seb and Sunny shared a look. Sunny’s eyebrows went up for a microsecond and then drew down.  
  
Sebastian looked at Kimi and spoke in a very low voice. "No one went for Shoe."  
  
Kimi and Jaamies’ eyebrows drew down, too.  
  
"I’m going to go get him. We can’t let them have him. All this work, what is the point if we lose him. My god, what they would do, with no one else to take this out on?"  
  
Kimi rubbed his hands over his face and through his hair. "You can’t go alone. We will come with you."  
  
"No. It will be obvious enough, after the broadcast tonight, without adding another world champion."  
  
"Where is Schumacher’s family?"  
  
"They are there, as far as anyone knows. There are FIA agents there all the time, posing as staff. FIA must think they have the situation under control." He paused. "I need you to distract Mindy."  
  
This non-sequitur made Kimi stop.  
  
"Mindy." Sebastian said, gesturing vaguely towards the radio room. "Mindy Hammond. She is married to Richard Hammond from Top Gear. Well, not Top Gear anymore."  
  
Kimi shrugged; he didn’t know who she was. When he'd done Top Gear it had been purely for Lotus PR, not as part of the subversive movement, and he hadn't spent any significant time with the presenters. He moved on. What Sebastian meant was beginning to dawn on him. "They don’t want you going?"  
  
"They want us to stay here and help control the Racing Drivers."  
  
He looked at Sebastian. Now he was really dreading what he was going to say next. He was shaking his head before Sebastian even started.  
  
"I saw what you and Jaamies did. You can control the whole group yourselves, you won’t need us."  
  
"Not 24 hours a day. Not all of them." He thought about how many minds he had felt. "Maybe a half of them for a few hours. Maybe a third, if we were working in shifts. Not for days. You will be gone for days."  
  
Sebastian looked at the ground. "I can’t risk FIA following us back."  
  
Kimi looked at the ground, too.  
  
The two men stood facing each other, but not looking at each other for a long time.  
  
"If you go tell Mindy you want to see the broadcast, she won’t notice when I go." Sebastian said quietly, not taking his eyes off the near leg of the cot.  
  
Kimi pursed his lips and nodded, not raising his eyes, either.  
  
Sebastian held his hand out and Kimi shook it. Kimi turned and walked towards the radio room, Jaamies trailing behind him. When he turned, at the door to the room, and looked back, Sebastian was already gone. He breathed deeply and asked Mindy to show him the broadcast.  
  
He watched the heralding of the end of the world, so his best friend could stop them from paying an even higher price. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> If you want to find out how Sebastian and Sunshine's mission to rescue Shoe and subsequent travels during the refugee days of the winter of 2016-2017, please read chapter 3 and 5 of "Tonsorial" (short stories)  
> Chapter 3- http://archiveofourown.org/works/8712529/chapters/19974526  
> Chapter 5- http://archiveofourown.org/works/8712529/chapters/20514157
> 
> In order to find out why Shoe must be rescued, please read "Choose."  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/7616257


	22. Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Jensen Button, Mindy Hammond, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Work**  
**Mercedes/McLaren/Manor Temporary Stable (Code name: The North Pole)- 2016**  
  
The hanger was cold. There were cots and blankets, and a mess tent outside. Wind blew through the open spaces around the big doors. No one had enough socks. Even Kimi had a blanket around him.  
  
"I own a yacht," Jenson muttered. He and Sugarboy were huddled under a blanket together. "I could have gone to sea and been perfectly safe. You could have come with me." They were seated on their cots, having waited in line for half an hour to get the soup from the mess tent.  
  
Kimi didn't have the energy to shake his head. "Have work to do." He spooned soup into his mouth. He winced when the spoon brushed his swollen lips.  
  
Jenson pushed the no longer steaming mug of soup into Sugarboy's hands. They were both scruffier than ever.  
  
"At least you have something to do." Jenson said.  
  
Kimi and Jaamies had been working 16 hours a day in the weeks since they'd gotten here. Sometimes, if he wasn't tripping over his own feet after making sure Jaamies got to his cupboard to sleep, he worked another 4 by himself. There were no secrets about what the Racing Drivers and their matches could do, now, since the first broadcast of the Grand Tour had ended normalcy for everyone who knew about Racing Drivers.  
  
There was no secret about what Kimi could do, anymore.  
  
"You could be working with the Racing Drivers, too. Sugarboy would translate if you asked him. We need all the help we can get. Not enough of the trained matches will help." Kimi stared into the bottom of his tin cup. He had given most of his portion to Jaamies, like Jenson had given most of his to Sugarboy. The Racing Drivers, with their higher metabolisms, felt the hunger pangs earlier and more often, and all the matches were losing weight compensating for it.  
  
It was really strange to see men who'd spent years straining to look just like their matches, now showing the differences.  
  
"I'm not a Trainer, like you. I can't talk to all of them, like you."  
  
He sighed and stood up. He was the only Trainer who didn't need his match present to work with the unmatched Racing Drivers, and so he was getting much more pressure than the other matches.  
  
"Every one of us is a trained handler. You have 20 years experience as a handler." Kimi twitched his lips. If Jenson and the other matches didn't see that, he couldn't make them see it. The Trainers, and the matches that could see it, they would just have to make do, controlling and exercising and dealing with the unmatched Tame Racing Drivers that had been removed from the stables the day of the first Grand Tour broadcast.  
  
He walked past the impromptu cupboards, really just curtained off areas, where the Racing Drivers were sleeping in shifts. He stopped in front of the curtain where Jaamies' mind was gently recalibrating. He touched the curtain, loving the way his partner's mind felt during this part of his day, but missing the reassurance and strength Jaamies had been pouring into him day after day. Giving Kimi his reserves of calm and happiness to pass out to the unmatched Racing Drivers. It wouldn't do to wake him up. He needed to recover. Kimi moved on, pulling a parka off the line of pegs beside the door of the hanger and gasping as he slung his blanket off of his arm and first the cold wind and then the chilled nylon touched his skin. He zipped the parka and wrapped the blanket around him.  
  
He opened the man sized door next to the hangar door and ran across the open space, fighting the wind the whole way, to the next hanger. These hangers empty along the tarmac of this Cold War airfield were separated into living space for the refugees, and holding and training space. The humans took up one hanger of the 6. The rest was allotted to the Racing Drivers.  
  
He opened the door to hanger 2.  
  
Inside it was a little warmer than in hanger 1. The Racing Drivers had a higher natural body temperature. Kimi felt bad that he hadn't left his blanket for Jenson. Then he decided that if Jenson wanted to be warm, he should come here and bring Sugarboy to work.  
  
"Raikkonen," a woman's voice called over the rising and falling engine noise of the Racing Drivers' voices. Kimi liked that Mindy called him by his last name. When you were a celebrity, everyone tended to assume you were on a first name basis. She was carrying a clipboard, because she didn't have a desk. It had about the same amount of paperwork a desk would have held. "I thought I told you not to come back until you got 8 hours of sleep."  
  
"I can't sleep. There is too much crying." He looked at her. Her eyes swept over him, and it made him uncomfortable. He could guess what she was seeing. He saw it often enough reflected in visors.  
  
The merlot colored bruises on his face and neck from Sebastian's berserker style assault had faded to yellow and green. Pale skin could bruise spectacularly. He'd lost a lot of weight since he'd gotten here. Racing Drivers burned more calories, and Jaamies was working harder than any of them, and everything was rationed so strictly, because it had to last until everyone could go home, or to wherever they would go after this was over. Kimi couldn't take more than their fair share, but he wouldn't stand Jaamies' hunger, either. After two weeks here, he'd looked like he hadn't since he was a teenager. Now he was starting to lose muscle tone.  
  
It wasn't just the food, either. The Racing Drivers had to be fed twice a day, taken outside to the runways and let exercise on the kart track, allowed to sleep in shifts, and kept from one another's throats. This had to be done on a rotational basis, because there wasn't enough of anything for anyone.  
  
This was being done in facilities all over the world right now. The Racing Drivers taken to secret locations and kept safe from vengeful companies. The friends and families of matches, crew members, team members, support staff, anyone who had signed the paperwork agreeing not to disclose about the Racing Drivers, who had shown willingness to defy the companies, when approached by a representative of the...resistance, it could be called. Anyone who was against what the companies were doing had been whisked away to a safe site.  
  
Kimi was just glad he'd been with Jaamies when it had happened. There was a match here who was visiting from Abu Dhabi when the raid had happened, and his Racing Driver was still there; there were a couple matches who lived here while their matches were stabled in team stables in other parts of the world, and half the matched Racing Drivers pulled from the stables had matches who'd been taken to other facilities.  
  
There would be an effort made to send matches to Racing Drivers, but the problem was, not all the matches were sympathetic to what had happened. That had been why Kimi had almost been left behind when they'd come for Jaamies and Sunshine. He'd never shown any inclination to resist the companies, and was in fact, considered one of their most loyal supporters.  
  
He'd been a little too bland in his acceptance of what they'd done to him, it seemed. Now he was here, though, and everyone knew why he hadn't been willing to rock the boat. His ability to feel all the Racing Drivers were feeling was a secret too valuable to let the companies have.  
  
It was an ability that was bringing him grief here, too - he could feel the stress all the Racing Drivers were feeling, being taken from their homes and brought to this unsuitable location. There wasn't enough space here for privacy, they didn't have enough resources, and the untrained stallions at each other whenever the insufficient supervision wasn't attentive enough.  
  
There was a reason that stables and holding facilities kept them in separate rooms. The unsocialized stallions would kill each other if they were left in the same space alone.  
He'd lost track of how many he'd felt die after the first half dozen. His mind was a raw nerve. Overwrought Racing Drivers weren't as careful when they needed to be physically separated from one another, and not all his bruises were from Sebastian. The swollen lip, for example, had been an unintentional blow from a flailing helmet.  
  
Mindy looked at him and he knew she saw a sleep deprived beating victim. It was still better than giving interviews.  
  
But with the Racing Drivers' unsleeping noise in his head as they rotated through their days, he couldn't sleep.  
  
"You have been here since last night when I started." He looked beyond her where two teenage girls were holding their own clipboards full of paperwork. "They are here again, with you."  
  
She looked, too. "They have their father's energy."  
  
"That is because they sleep when they should."  
  
"Don't you turn this around on ME Raikkonen. You trainers think you know what's best for everyone."  
  
Kimi smirked. "We see what is to be seen."  
  
He took the clipboard from her hand. "Izzy," he called to the older girl. "Take your mother and sister to the mess tent. While the soup is still a little hot." He was good at being a Trainer and Trainers were not above applying pressure to weaknesses.  
  
The older girl took her sister's clipboard and her own and handed them to Kimi. "Thanks, Mr. Raikkonen." She looked up with a tired, determined face and open gratitude.  
  
He nodded to her, and looked at the three clipboards. Those girls, and the other kids here, were putting in a lot of long hours, too. They were all kids whose parents knew what a work ethic was, and showed that they knew, too.  
  
Their father would be very proud when he got back.  
  
A hand reached over his shoulder. "I'll take one of those." Jenson took Willow's clipboard off the stack. "You're right, I should be in here doing something useful."  
  
Kimi grinned and handed him half of Izzy's paperwork, too. "You will be more help if you take the B and C group out to the track and let them run for an hour."  
  
"There's..." Jenson looked at the paperwork. "200 Racing Drivers in the B and C groups. You want me to handle them all by myself? The guys from the rally teams are only handling 40 or 50."  
  
"We'll work up to what you two can really handle, later. Those rally drivers only have half as much time racing as you have. You won't be alone, either, you'll have Sugarboy." Kimi patted Jenson on the back, "If the Stigs-" It was strange using the new popular term after years of calling them Racing Drivers, "-give you any trouble, just have Sugarboy show them his World Championship."  
  
If only they had a multiple world champ here, they'd have no trouble at all. If Sebastian was here, at least he'd have someone to talk to.  
  
He was missing his best friend a lot right now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> If you would like more about Jenson and Sugarboy and their partnership, please read "Transmit Clearly" (by Theianitor)  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/11229672
> 
> and "McLaren"  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/11042799


	23. No Time for Heroes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Jensen Button, Mindy Hammond, Richard Hammond, Stoffel Vandoorne, Jeremy Clarkson, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- No Time For Heroes**  
 **Mercedes/McLaren/Manor Temporary Stable (Code name: The North Pole)- 2017**   
  
The sun was still hanging behind the low clouds that ringed the airfield. The radio call had come in a few minutes before and sent large portions of the refugees to assigned posts around the compound. They had become efficient over the months they'd been living and working together. Everyone knew their job, and where to be today.   
  
Kimi and Jaamies jogged down the well shovelled path between knee high snow banks. The snow was layered with grit and ice. They were headed out to the kart track, where the mid-day exercise group was running karts.   
  
After years of living in warmer climates, the force of the Alpine winter had come as an unusually fierce reminder of how cold the world could really be. He’d lost his knack for facing the chill, but now it was coming back to him. He and Jaamies moved easily, only wearing light coats despite the bracing wind. They’d been in good condition before, but now they were hard in a way that modern civilization didn’t really allow for.   
  
Jaamies sent out a call to the teams monitoring the exercise. Sleeping and eating could be done anytime, but exercise had to happen during the daylight hours. The karts tended to be too cold in the mornings and evenings. They didn’t have as many as they’d started with, either. The constant usage had taken its toll, even in a place populated almost entirely by mechanics and engineers. There were a quarter of the Racing Drivers out on the airfield, half waiting to take their turn as soon as the others finished their hour.   
  
From across the tarmac, Kimi could see the change in the movements of the crowd ahead the moment Jaamies called to the handlers. The waiting Racing Drivers began shuffling towards the side of the trampled snow on the side of the field, and the karts that were passing the finish line were peeling off to the sideline where the kart storage area was. As Drivers dismounted their karts, waiting Drivers moved forward to help maneuver the karts out of the way. A figure on the near end of the track turned and waved at Kimi from beside his match. The match continued gesturing and sending out messages to individuals and the group at large.   
  
On the far side of the kart track, the other team waved briefly before going back to directing traffic. More karts poured off the track, getting in each other’s way with a great deal of arm waving gestures and the noise level rising and echoing out across the empty valley.   
  
The Racing Drivers who’d parked or helped park karts were now moving briskly out of the way, and the first few of them passed Kimi on the trampled way back to the hangers. They were gesturing to one another, Stallions and Mares, disappointed, but not devastated, and all calm, doing what their group leaders had directed. They all looked up and greeted the head Trainer team as they passed.   
  
Jenson Button turned and shook Kimi’s hand as they approached him on the edge of the track. Sugarboy waved over his shoulder and then pointed and gestured at a group of Racing Drivers around two karts which had bumped into each other, tangled fenders and stalled.   
  
The other team was headed back across the rapidly emptying, now mostly empty, track. Jaamies jogged down to the crowd of Racing Drivers to help get the mess moved out of the way.   
  
The team on the far side slowed and turned to look back the way they’d come. A moment later, helmets raised in the group of Racing Drivers on the track. Then the sound of helicopter rotors became audible to Kimi.   
  
The Racing Drivers redoubled their efforts to separate and clear the karts, now significantly more synchronized in their efforts. One group pushed, the other lifted, and the karts came free and were hustled away. Jaamies started jogging back.   
  
Jenson was staring at the sky, hands on hips. He had always been fit, but in the months at the airfield he’d put on a lot of muscle. Sugarboy had slimmed down. The two were now visibly different at a distance.   
  
Kimi watched Jaamies come across the track. He had put on muscle, too. His stocky shoulders were thicker, and he’d started to like lifting weights. Jenson had discovered the pieces of an old weight bench in one of the junk filled storage rooms in hangar 6, and he’d put it together, repaired it, and started using it to keep up with his fitness regime. Jaamies had come across him using it one day and Jenson had taught him to spot, and then to lift. Since then, a lot of the refugees, and quite a few of the Racing Drivers, had taken an interest. They had cobbled together a few more benches, using bits of junk and irreparably damaged karts. Now there was a sign-up sheet.   
  
It was funny the way Jaamies flexed in the mirrors in the locker room. He was very impressed with his new physique. He’d always stayed as light as he could when racing F1, and even more so when they’d raced rally. Now he kept making Kimi come watch him lift heavy things. Kimi showed himself suitably impressed with the lifting of whatever crate/piece of equipment/large toolbox, and then went back to his own work. It was hard not to chuckle at the new enthusiasm.   
  
The helicopters rose above the fog blocking the view of the other side of the quiet valley. They were two large personnel carriers. Someone from the hanger carrying orange flags, passed Kimi and Jenson, headed down onto the empty track. Jenson watched the helicopter for a moment longer.   
  
The other group lead team, finally arrived from the other side of the field and greeted them. "We’d better get them split back into their groups." There was a sort of lift at the end of his statement that made it apparent he was asking Jenson more than making a statement. Stoffel and his Racing Driver were in their early 20’s. They’d done two years in GP2 before this had happened, and the Driver, one of Lentaa's sons, (not surprising since the group here was from the Mercedes/McLaren stable) was only nominally in control of his portion of the group.   
  
Jenson nodded. It had been Sugarboy who’d put out the word for the Racing Drivers to move off the tracks, and it had been Sugarboy they’d obeyed. The other team was a good relay, and they had very much come into their own since being here, but Jenson and Sugarboy had learned to shine.   
  
They could’ve pushed the 400 Racing Drivers into far more extreme activity than just clearing off the track neatly.   
  
They had a natural talent for working with Racing Drivers. Kimi had been very impressed by the hard work they’d put in and by the return they’d gotten from it. All the teams here had gotten much better at communicating, working with unmatched Drivers, and generally getting things done. He wondered how the F1 drivers were faring in the other camps. The only thing he’d heard had been rare, extremely covert transmissions from Sebastian, telling them not to worry, that he and Michael’s family were safe, moving from place to place, hiding, but safe.   
  
He looked at the helicopters coming in. This was his opportunity to find out.   
  
Jenson clapped him on the shoulder and he and Sugarboy and the younger team headed down the road to the hanger, already separating the Racing Drivers ahead of them into their assigned groups.   
  
They passed a small group of people coming towards the field and the handler teams nodded politely.   
  
Mindy planted herself right beside Kimi. Her daughters ranged out beside her. She crossed her arms. He buried a smirk and imitated her gesture. Jaamies put his chin on Kimi’s shoulder. The head engineer from McLaren stood somewhat behind Mindy, with the wife of a Mercedes executive beside him, and the woman who’d run the cleaning and maintenance department at the McLaren/Mercedes stable.   
  
The helicopters landed. A tall grey haired figure stepped out. He was followed by a white helmeted figure and a short brunette man with a goatee.   
  
Jeremy Clarkson strode across the track like a king returning victorious. The effect was somewhat ruined by the smaller man crashing into him as he scrambled past, sprinting across the distance. The Racing Driver brushed past as well, turning his helmet to rev an apology over his shoulder as he followed his match.   
  
Kimi might have expected Mindy to run to greet him, but she stayed stock still, the girls shifting only slightly beside her. He could feel the tension of self control rolling off her.   
  
Hammond slowed to a stop a pace from her. His grin was wide and breathless.   
  
She stood, arms crossed and stared at him. Expressionless.   
  
He heaved a happy breath and looked back at her.   
  
"Mr. Hammond. It’s nice of you to show up."   
  
He arranged his face into a serious one, but his Racing Driver bumped into him from the back, and he turned to grin and push at him playfully. He put his serious face back on. "Mrs. Hammond, I’m glad to be here. May we have permission to abrogate your facility and discharge your refugees?" He was having a hard time keeping the broad smile off his face.   
  
Her eyes were teary suddenly. She swallowed a smile. "Is it really over, Richard?" she whispered.   
  
Jeremy and the helicopter crew arrived with the group.   
  
Richard nodded, the grin splitting his face again. "Yes, it is, lovely. Legal recognition in the United Nations."   
  
She closed her eyes.   
  
Kimi felt a jump in his own chest. He sent a wave of happiness to Jaamies.   
  
"Permission granted, Mr. Hammond. We will begin decamping procedures immediately."   
  
"Let’s go home, Mindy." He raised his voice, and behind him, Stiggy gestured a translation. "We’re all going home!"   
  
Kimi turned and faded back through the crowd. He and Jaamies started sending instructions. They had been planning and preparing for this; everyone knew where they should be and what they should do. He had too much to get to stand here and play delegation to the returning heroes.   
  
After all, unless he missed his guess, the decamping procedures were going to take further weeks to implement. Unless the Grand Tour crew had a lot more helicopters in their pockets. And they’d only brought two Racing Drivers to help. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	24. Coming Home to Roost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Richard Hammond, Stoffel Vandoorne, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- Coming Home To Roost**  
 **Mercedes/McLaren/Manor Temporary Stable (Code name: The North Pole)- 2017**  
  
The weather had eased up. Today, 3 days after the helicopters had landed; it was just clear and cold. Most of the human refugees had been taken by bus away from the airfield. Only essential personnel remained. They had been slowly shipping out the Racing Drivers to more suitable locations until they could be granted citizenship individually.  
  
Kimi was startled by a scream and the ripple of alarm that spread out through the Racing Drivers. He was across the refugee's hanger to the sleeping closets before he'd realized he was doing anything at all.  
  
Stoffel was on a cot, chest heaving, face buried in his hands, his Racing Driver patting him firmly on the back. His Driver was completely confused as to why there had been screaming.  
  
Mindy's husband, Richard (Kimi had spent 4 months in close contact with Mindy and would now always view Richard as first her husband, and only second as the man from the Grand Tour) was gesturing to his Racing Driver, Stiggy, who was backed halfway into one of the closets, eyes fixed on the pair on the cot. Stiggy was sending out waves of bewilderment, asking why the boy had screamed at him.  
  
[What is this?] Kimi asked. He didn't have time for fights among the teams -especially when the Grand Tour crew were involved.  
  
Stoffel took a deep breath and stood up and screamed at Richard. "Where did you get him?!" He pointed at Stiggy.  
  
"I brought him with me." Richard said, not understanding the intent of the question. "He's the second Stig; he's been on Top Gear for years..." He waved a hand at the boys pointing finger like he was warding it off.  
  
Stiggy stepped out of the closet, dragging Richard with him, and grabbed Kimi's arm. He sent an image of Mindy talking to him, telling him how she'd met his hero and asking why he hadn't ever mentioned that Kimi could talk to all the Racing Drivers. He sent to Kimi that ever since Kimi had talked to him when he was at the stable, he had had hope that there was something better. Otherwise he wouldn't have made it to the matching with Richard. He couldn't give Kimi's secret away. Kimi would tell this man that he was not his brother, he wasn't even human. Stiggy trusted Kimi.  
  
But Stoffel's brother was dead, he couldn't be Stiggy. Even if Stoffel thought they looked alike.  
  
Everything started clicking into place.  
  
The comment Mindy had made about his being her husband's Racing Driver's hero came back to him. Her husband's Racing Driver was Stiggy. Kimi had met him when he got sent to do Top Gear. He hadn't said much, even for a Racing Driver. Kimi had assumed the 'he doesn't talk' thing was a deeper joke than the audience would get.  
  
Then the comment Jeremy had made about Kimi being Stiggy's hero came back to him. He'd assumed that was entirely for the show, making it seem like The Stig was really a human. But he was obviously a Racing Driver.  
  
A Racing Driver he'd met before he'd been matched with Richard, Kimi realized. He'd never put the two incidents together in his mind.

Right at the end of his apprenticeship, before he'd been sent away from F1 because of Michael and Top Gear losing the first white Stig. He'd met a Racing Driver who loved tracks more than he loved cars. Whose intended match was dead, saving Stoffel from the ice. Kimi knew Stoffel's brother had died, before he could bond, and the company had found a Driver for Stoffel instead. He'd watched Stoffel's career because of it.

And here was Stiggy. Who looked just like Stoffel's brother, and nothing like Richard.  
  
A Racing Driver who looked nothing like his match.  
  
Who raced almost exclusively on one track.  
  
Kimi took a deep breath.  
  
Who would have imagined that Driver was still alive?  
  
Who would have imagined he was the second Stig?  
  
Kimi waved Stiggy and Mindy’s husband away. He patted Stoffel on the back and then sat down beside him. "Let me explain what has happened; there is something you may not know about your brother."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.


	25. No Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, Jeremy Clarkson, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- No Choice**  
**Mercedes/McLaren/Manor Temporary Stable (Code name: The North Pole)- 2017**  
  
The Grand Tour crew hadn’t all come. Most of it was spread among different stables across the world. James May and the Stig were in America, making contact with Lewis and Nico, who had been overseeing the truly massive camp of the NASCAR refugees. The McLaren/Mercedes and Manor refugee camp was only graced by two of the GT3 because it was the biggest camp in Europe, by Kimi’s count.  
  
And Clarkson didn’t have a Racing Driver, so he was just a figurehead. Hammond and May would be working whichever camps they visited. Kimi had managed to avoid them, aside from the incident with Stoffel early on. He had no time for heroes, he had work to do.  
  
As the two crossed the hangar floor on their way off shift, a week after the Grand Tour crew had arrived, Jaamies put his arm around Kimi's shoulders. Kimi grinned. In the months spent living in the hangers (where they would continue living, long after most of the human refugees had left, until the day the last of the Tame Racing Drivers had gone) he'd remembered what it was like to feel free. It wasn't the Racing Drivers that had held him down, it was the oppression of the companies. Now that the oppression was gone, and the Racing Drivers were all free, now that they were all Stigs, and there were no stables anymore, he was at a bit of a loose end.  
  
"Hey Raikkonen," he heard. Kimi turned and it was as if the crowd parted. It was the natural ebb and flow of people, of course, but it seemed providential when he turned and a space opened, so he could approach Jeremy Clarkson with no interference.  
  
Jeremy was standing next to a very young blonde man and his Racing Driver. Kimi shook hands with the men, and sent a greeting to Freeza, the Racing Driver. Jaamies nodded at the men and patted Freeza on the shoulder.  
  
"Kimi. You know Max already, and of course, you know Freeza." Kimi nodded. Max Chilton and Freeza had been in the paddock several years before.  
  
Max grinned at Kimi, and then at Clarkson and lead his Racing Driver off through the crowd.  
  
Jeremy watched them go.  
  
"Freeza is going to the BBC, he's going to be their new Stig. I know you can be trusted not to share that piece of information with anyone."  
  
Jaamies laughed, and Clarkson looked at him, a little grief in his eyes for a moment.  
  
"We all heard about what you did, while we were broadcasting The Grand Tour. I was wondering if you'd like to..."  
  
Kimi put a hand up in the stop gesture and interrupted Jeremy. "I'm not going to give any more interviews."  
  
"I was wondering if you'd like to come to Antarctica with us, when we go back next year." Jaamies turned his head towards Kimi when Jeremy said this. "We heard about how you kept the whole camp together practically single handed. Mindy Hammond was extremely impressed with what you accomplished, and with only Jenson to help you. No other team would have had enough influence. We'd planned for Vettel to be here, but..."  
  
Kimi shook his head. "He did the right thing. We couldn't have afforded to lose...that price would be too high."  
  
"We're taking him to Antarctica."  
  
Kimi thought that Clarkson meant Sebastian for a moment.  
  
Then he realised that he really meant Shoe.  
  
"We want you both there when we go back. We want to show them what OUR finest have accomplished. Stig and Stiggy say the Free Racing Drivers have so many races that there's no way they'd respect what most of the Tame ones have done unless they see how much bigger our races are. Stig and Stiggy have driven the biggest fastest cars out there, but they've only raced on the show. So we need to bring the power when we go back."  
  
Kimi shook his head. "Who else are you taking?"  
  
Jeremy looked at him. "With you three, who else would we need?"  
  
Kimi's eyes narrowed in anger. How dare this man ask him that? "You think-" His voice was low and he was shaking with rage. "You think-" he started again, because his mouth was so dry.  
  
Jaamies made a noise beside him.  
  
"You think that because I can speak to them, that I am the best human to send? Jaamies, yes, he is a good Trainer, he is the best, but you think I am the man they will respect, because I can speak to them? Your broadcasts said they could speak to anyone who had been matched. Why would I be different? I am NOT the man they would most respect."  
  
Jeremy seemed stunned by this reaction. "Who..."  
  
"You should have sent Michael!!" Kimi was far from yelling, but somehow his low speech was louder and more threatening than a yell. "He should BE here for you to send. We all know what he did to save your Stig. We all know what he paid. You are sending Shoe to the South Pole? He should not have to be -alone.-"  
  
Jeremy reached a hand out. "Kimi."

Kimi stepped back. "He paid, and you forgot Shoe, and Sebastian nearly DIED getting him out. Hiding him. If your plan had worked, Sebastian STILL would have left the airfield and gone for Shoe, and Jenson would have been there alone. With a thousand unmatched Racing Drivers. Because Jeremy Fucking Clarkson thinks he can play god."  
  
Jaamies was making a grinding noise and pulling on Kimi's arm now.  
  
The rage was in Kimi's chest, now, constricting his heart and taking over everything. "-You- told them to take Jaamies and leave me."  
  
Now there were tears, because he hadn't let himself think about it in such straight terms before. Those men had come to his home, with guns, to take his partner away, to force him at gunpoint to stay behind and watch them load the other half of his soul into a van and drive him away.  
  
Because Jeremy Clarkson thought Kimi would oppose him.  
  
"You care so much for Racing Drivers that you would cut one apart because you were afraid."  
  
Jeremy had gone hard-faced now, and though Kimi had stepped back, the older man was still looming over him head and shoulders. "Sometimes amputation is necessary to save a life." His jaw was set, and he spoke in a grating voice.  
  
"Gangrene does not spend the next 4 months living in an airplane hangar keeping 15 hundred people from killing one another."  
  
"You shouldn't have had to do that."  
  
"No! The options are never good! I do what is done because the other option is letting them die! Like always, I am choosing between protecting mine and protecting the Racing Drivers. Sebastian HAS to go for Shoe, because you forget. I have to stay and take care of the Drivers, because no one else can. I have to learn to Train because they take Jaamies away if I don't. We stay in F1 because they kill him if we don't. We go to rally, we go to Lotus, we go to Ferrari, we go to McLaren. We drive. There is no option. We are one Racing Driver. Like Michael and Shoe were one Racing Driver. Like you were."  
  
Kimi spat the last words, looking Clarkson straight in the eye.  
  
"And there is never a good option."  
  
"No, there never was." Jeremy looked like he wanted to give Kimi a hug.  
  
Kimi stepped back, moving Jaamies back with him.  
  
"Kimi, now there will be some options. Look around you. All the Racing Drivers that were here, they're not going back. No one is ever going to hold them, or you and yours, at knifepoint again." Jeremy looked down at him, and his eyebrows raised slightly.  
  
"Doesn't change that you were going to take him away."  
  
Jeremy's lips pursed. "I suppose it doesn't. You won't come, then?"  
  
Kimi raised his head, eyes blazing. "You want to show them the best of what we have, here, I am the last man you want to bring. No Trainers, ever. I have done the company's demands, and put others to do the same. Everything I ever hated done to me, I have done."  
  
"To protect..."  
  
"Michael…" Kimi started.  
  
This time Jeremy's face twisted in rage. "Michael chose what he did. Shoe chose what he did. On purpose. For this. You spit on their sacrifice if you think it wasn't for you and Jaamies as much as it was for any of the others. Maybe even more than the others. If you think you had it easier because you made the choices you made, just realize they needed MUCH more leverage against you. Trainers are always picked from matches who resist. The companies keep their friends close and their enemies closer. You felt like your fate was tied to theirs, yes?"  
  
Kimi looked down. If he hadn't stayed in the eye of the storm, they'd have done so much worse.  
  
"They engineered that, Kimi. They did it to all the Trainers. You think the bad options stopped when he," he waved at Jaamies, "took off his helmet? There was never a good option."  
  
Jaamies pressed against him. Loving him. They were both shaking.  
  
This time he didn't resist Clarkson collecting him up in a hug. Collecting them both. Forgiving them for surviving.  
  
No matter what they’d done. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> If you wonder what caused the Top Gear/Grand Tour guys to do all of this, please read "Tame Racing Driver," The first story in this series.  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/7615867


	26. The Grid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gone Cold  
> Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers  
> Part 4- Gone Cold  
> Fandom- Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour
> 
> In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Drivers, not everyone is willing to be a martyr for the cause.  
> For some matches, having a Racing Driver is nothing they ever wanted, too bad they can't get out.
> 
> Tags: Formula 1, Top Gear, The Grand Tour, Kimi Raikkonen, The Entire Grid, Alternate Universe, Slavery

**Chapter- The Grid**  
**Yas Marina Circuit, Abu Dhabi, UAE- 2017**

Since all contracts had been dissolved by the revelation of the Racing Drivers, the 2017 opening grid of the Formula 1 race season was a very different place than it had been the year before.

There were humans racing, for one thing.

The Racing Drivers were now racing openly under their own names. They were being called Stigs, instead of Racing Drivers, now. There was no reason to pretend they were the same as the humans in the Paddock. They kept the term Paddock. The Stigs were universally proud of what their predecessors had accomplished. They weren't men, they were stallions, and it was men who were the newcomers to the grid. They could acknowledge that they were being invited into a Stig place.

The human drivers walked softly on the hallowed ground, there for the first time as competitors, instead of masks.

The Driver photo was something to behold.

Felipe was there, side by side with Mancha. The McLaren team was looking set to win some serious races. Their issues had cleared up with the help of a couple Stig engineers. It turned out the tri-tone Racing Drivers were more mechanically inclined than driving inclined, and all the teams were performing at a higher level, now.

The dynamic combination of Nico Hulkenberg's Hulk and Tatiana Calderon's Mare, Bandera had been adopted as drivers for Haas. Jaamies and Lentaa's youngest brother seemed very comfortable on the American team. Kumai Kobayashi was technically a driving consultant, and most of the time his Racing Driver was more interested in what the engineers were doing to the car.

Making a return to F1, Caterham, the third team which was fielding a human had also hired his Racing Driver. Except Pauli was Caterham's test driver, and Valtteri was in the number one car, alongside teammate Jean-Eric Vergne's Racing Driver, JEV, while Rio Haryanto's Arrow was the teams' second test driver.

Manor, Sauber, Toro Rosso, and Renault had all stepped pretty easily into the new pattern, their teams consisted entirely of Racing Drivers. Their matches were hovering about, ready to translate interviews or help their partners out.

Daniel Ricciardo had immediately left racing once his contract dissolved, taking Oz, his Racing Driver, and going to college to study applied physics. This appeared to be a Dan-themed trend, because he went to the same school and took a lot of the same classes as Daniil Kvyat, who left with his Racing Driver at the same time. Riccardo's departure left a hole in Red Bull's roster, into which they slotted Alondra, who was one of the few Racing Drivers who was younger than his match, and had a lot of good years left in his career. Pilot stayed on, and rumor had it he'd stuck to the decision despite Max's efforts to get him to switch to a different team. Between the 4, the spread of ages was 19, 22, 32 and 36.

Lewis and Snap decided to stay at Mercedes, since it had been going well for them and the car was now even sexier. Nico left to go into engineering and Prince went with him. It was bittersweet to see Shoe's oldest foal leave racing to go into dance. Their spot was taken by Carlos Sainz's Driver, Fili.

The sadness at seeing Prince go was somewhat balanced by the two legacies joining the grid in their rookie season with the Force India team. Gee was the first Racing Driver to be ever signed to an F1 team without his match being an in-pit team member. He spoke through a Racing Driver and match translating team. His partner was often around the tracks, when he wasn't studying the cello at Juilliard in New York. His teammate was the final human on the grid, but no one doubted the rookie's natural ability and the very different, but just as valid racing legacy he brought with him, a legacy of success that could finally be acknowledged. Mick Schumacher was the son of the best human racing driver to ever live.

And Sunshine was there. At the head of the Ferrari drivers, the golden boy dressed in scarlet. And beside him, his pale blond teammate. Gold and Silver.

But not the Sun and the Moon. Kleverig was a good driver, and he would grow into his role as Sunshine's teammate, but the two would never have quite the same connection as had been been Sunshine and Jaamies.

Because for only the 3rd time since the turn of the Millennium, Jaamies wasn't going to appear in the Formula 1 Driver's picture.

Because when the contracts had dissolved, Kimi had been ready to sign again, with whichever team would have them, to keep Jaamies in the driver's seat. Instead, Jaamies had taken Kimi by the hand and led him away. And for the first time in over 15 years, Kimi realised what Jaamies had never let him see. The reason his unease at being trapped by FIA had never gone away. Because all those years, love the cars and the speed as he might, Jaamies had never wanted to be there, either.

Cars and speed were all well and good, but Kimi, Kimi was home. Jaamies didn't like travelling. He just wanted home.

So they stood, beside Sebastian and Kevin Magnussen, and watched the first day of the new world. Watched the two Ferrari drivers, and all the other drivers, talking and laughing, the rev of engines and the sweep of gestures dominating the conversations. In this it would be the humans who would have to adapt, but each of them had been working with a Racing Driver for years, and they could gesture as easily, or more easily, than they could speak English, previously the common language of the paddock. This would make certain things much easier.

The photograph ended, and Kevin went to stand beside Kleverig, sharing in his partner's delight.

Sunshine came to them, though, arms out and patting and hugging Sebastian, Jaamies, and Kimi. Sebastian was drawn towards the crowd of racers, and as he went, he cast a look back over his shoulder. Jaamies raised a hand just a bit, and Kimi nodded slightly.

Sebastian disappeared into the milling mass of drivers, and Kimi turned away.

A woman was standing in front of him with a microphone.

"Kimi Raikkonen," she said, "You and your Racing Driver have retired from F1, what are you going to do, now?"

He reached out and gently directed the microphone away from his face. He shook his head at her, walking past with a smile playing on his lips.

What Kimi Raikkonen was going to do now was take Jaamies and go home.

Go home and never give another interview.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> If you want a bigger view of the events of the opening race of the F1 2017 season, as put on almost entirely by the refugees of the Grand Tour, please read "On The Grid."  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/10391016
> 
> Thank you for reading Gone Cold.
> 
> For more of Kimi and Jaamies' adventures during the course of their career, please read "Jaamies."  
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/10920495
> 
>  
> 
> If you have any questions or comments, please let me know what you thought. I love talking about this Verse.

**Author's Note:**

> If this made you feel anything, please leave a comment.
> 
> This was beta'd by Marginaliana.
> 
> Who is responsible for some of the best lines, and without whom, none of this series would have been possible. You saved me, Marginaliana!


End file.
